VIDEO: World Superbike Magny-Cours Preview

Following the cancellation of the South African round of the FIM Superbike World Championship, just two race weekends—Magny-Cours in France and Losail in Qatar—remain this season. Current champion Tom Sykes maintains the series points lead on his factory Kawasaki, while Aprilia rider Sylvain Guintoli and Pata Honda's Jonathan Rea are second and third, 31 and 67 points adrift, respectively.

With 100 points still on the table, Sykes acknowledged that it’s “crunch time” and hopes to perform better than he did at the most recent round in Jerez, Spain. “Despite scoring a podium in race two,” he said, “we had a few issues, especially in race one. At this present time, we are in a good championship position. Hopefully we can stretch it a bit more this weekend.”

Guintoli and teammate Marco Melandri traded wins at Jerez. “I still have a chance,” Guintoli said, “so I’ll take all risks and try to beat Tom.” Melandri also has a mathematical shot at the title, but he’s running out of time. “I’m sure the competition will be heated,” he said, “but I have taken advantage of this month to recharge my batteries and I’m ready for battle on the track.”

Rea admitted that long gaps between races make maintaining any kind of rhythm difficult. "I've been doing a lot of training on my CRF450R just to keep my levels of concentration as high as possible," he said. "In Jerez, we had really good pace at the end of the races—probably among the strongest. We need to work on getting that pace earlier in the race to allow us to challenge for podiums and wins."

Both races will be broadcast live in the US on cable channel BeIN Sport.