Miguel Oliveira rewarded by “whatever I do” in WorldSBK

Former MotoGP rider Miguel Oliveira says he is “rewarded” for “whatever” he does in WorldSBK, from a riding perspective.

Oliveira’s rookie World Superbike season got off to an underwhelming start in Australia, at least from a results perspective, as a crash on his first flying lap in Superpole left him last on the grid for, ultimately, all three races.

In Portugal, however, the BMW rider was third in all three races after qualifying on the second row in fourth. They were results that came after Oliveira shared his satisfaction of riding the WorldSBK machine.

“It was such an exciting move for me because I was getting the chance to be on a competitive bike, in a competitive championship,” Miguel Oliveira told WorldSBK.com in an interview conducted before the Portuguese Round.

“I feel like, whatever I do on the bike, it’s rewarded – instantly, almost – because I make some effort on my riding, I do a couple of tweaks and I get a result. 

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“I think the Superbike format, it still gives the rider a lot of room to show [their] potential and I think that was the most interesting factor. 

“Since November, when I first jumped on the BMW bike, I could sense the championship is really on a high level; every rider is very competent, very fast. 

“But I feel the potential is quite high for myself, and I see the competitors in a very good shape, in a very good level. Not only them, but also the bikes; I think the bikes now are very well balanced between each other.”

Oliveira joined World Superbike this year with the factory BMW team after a career in MotoGP that started at the very beginning of the ride height device era, in 2019, and ended last year with Pramac Yamaha after stints with KTM and Aprilia before that.

One of the criticisms levelled at MotoGP in recent years, as ride height devices and downforce aerodynamics have become an increasingly vital aspect of performance, is that the balance of performance in the combination of bike and rider is being shifted increasingly in the direction of the bike.

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WorldSBK has had downforce aerodynamics since Ducati introduced its V4 R in 2019, but they are much less refined in the production derivative series compared to MotoGP’s prototype bikes and therefore less impactful. Ride height devices, on the other hand, have never been used in WorldSBK.