Following a dramatic season opener at Le Mans, Schlosser and Schmidt (Yamaha) arrive at the iconic coastal venue with momentum on their side. The pair finished second in the Sprint race behind defending champions Harrison Payne and Kevin Rousseau (Yamaha), before dominating the Main race to take a commanding points lead.
In contrast, Payne and Rousseau’s campaign took a hit after their win in the Sprint. A mechanical failure on the opening lap of Sunday’s race saw them retire and drop to fourth in the standings — a costly no-score in what promises to be a closely fought season.
Consistency paid dividends for British brothers Sam and Thomas Christie (Yamaha), who recorded back-to-back third-place finishes to sit second overall, 13 points off the leaders and ahead of 2022–23 champions Todd Ellis and Emmanuelle Clement (Yamaha). The British/French pairing sits third after finishing fourth in both races at Le Mans.
Just a single point separates Ellis/Clement from Payne/Rousseau in fourth, while veteran British pairing Tim Reeves and Mark Wilkes (Yamaha) are fifth after finishing fifth in both races.
In total, the top five teams boast 14 FIM gold medals between them, but the battle extends further down the order.
Five-time world champion Pekka Päivärinta (Yamaha), racing alongside Britain’s Adam Christie for a second season, endured a mixed weekend in France. The Finn spun at the start of the Sprint and was later involved in a tangle with Sam and Jack Laidlow (Yamaha), ruling both outfits out of the race.
Päivärinta and Christie bounced back on Sunday, slicing through the field and pulling off a last-lap move on the Christie brothers to claim second place in the shortened 12-lap Main race. Despite the recovery, their DNF in Race 1 leaves them playing catch-up.
The German/French pairing of Patrick Werktetter and Valentin Pirat showed top-five potential across both races, while the Laidlow brothers recovered from their Saturday crash to finish sixth on Sunday after late-night repairs.
The Estoril weekend will feature a 10-lap Sprint race at 11:20am (local time) on Sunday 27 April, followed by a 17-lap Main race at 4:00pm. With form fluctuating early in the season and five rounds still to come, the championship remains wide open.
