Kyle Ryde team to miss BSB Donington test after Ducati announcement

Reigning BSB champion Kyle Ryde's Nitrous Competitions Racing team is set to miss the Donington Park test on 3–4 April after an announcement made on social media.

The Nitrous Competitions team announced on Instagram on Thursday (26 March) that its "full team" would not be attending the first UK test of the 2026 BSB preseason at Donington at the beginning of April as it will be heading to Italy instead.

The reason for this, it says, is to finalise the preparation of its race bikes for the upcoming season.

“We are sorry to say that the full team will not be present at the first 2026 British Superbike Official Test at Donington Park – but it’s for a good reason,” the Nitrous Competitions Racing social media post reads.

“We are heading to Ducati Corse next week to complete the build of our 2026 race bikes for Glenn Irwin and Kyle Ryde”.

Ryde himself will be at the Donington test riding his own Panigale V4 R training bike, as confirmed by BSB.

Nitrous Competitions took over the running of what used to be the OMG Racing team in BSB midway through last year after the company initially rescued the squad from collapse before the season started.

The team was originally slated to run three riders – Kyle Ryde, Bradley Ray, and Joe Talbot – in 2025, but that was cut to one when Nitrous Competitions stepped in after it initially appeared that OMG would not be able to take part in the season at all.

Ryde remained with the team while Ray moved to Raceways Yamaha and Talbot landed in the Supersport class.

After Nitrous Competitions took over the running of the team, Glenn Irwin was signed as a second rider after he split with PBM Ducati who had replaced him with Scott Redding since he was injured at round three in Snetterton.

Irwin was never able to completely gel with the Yamaha R1 that Ryde ultimately rode to a second consecutive BSB title in 2025, but the team announced a switch to Ducati for 2026 towards the end of last year.

Irwin is much more experienced with Ducati machinery and finished second in the championship on one in 2023 when he lost out on the title by half-a-point to his then-teammate Tommy Bridewell. He has also won multiple races at the North West 200 aboard the Ducati, and will return to the Northern Irish road race this year with Nitrous Competitions having previously announced his retirement from the race after the 2024 edition.