Phillip Island WSBK: Rea takes Superpole race win

Jonathan Rea rebounded from his disastrous start to the new World Superbike season by winning the Superpole race at Phillip Island.

After crashing out of Saturday’s opening race following contact with former teammate Tom Sykes on the first lap, Rea once again grabbed the advantage off the line, jumping into the lead heading into Turn 1 ahead of Race 1 winner Toprak Razgatlioglu.

The Kawasaki rider maintained his advantage until the penultimate lap, surviving an attack from the Ducati of Scott Redding at Honda corner on lap four of 10 as the British Superbike champion found a way past Razgatlioglu for second place.

Razgatlioglu re-emerged as Rea’s main challenger three laps later, passing Redding at Honda, and then repeating the move on lap nine to clear Rea for the top spot.

Rea responded heading into the Hayshed to wrest back the lead, only for Razgatlioglu to re-pass at Honda on the final lap.

But the five-time champion was able to duck underneath his Yamaha rival at the very last corner and pick up his first win of the season by just 0.067 seconds, with Redding again completing the podium a further five thousandths behind in third.

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Alex Lowes was fourth on the second Kawasaki, shadowing the leading trio for much of the race without ever getting involved in the lead fight, finishing 0.205s behind Rea.

Yamaha man Michael van der Mark was fifth ahead of BMW rider Sykes and the Ten Kate Yamaha of Loris Baz, the top seven split by 1.8 seconds.

Leon Haslam couldn’t replicate his impressive Saturday performance on the all-new factory Honda and had to settle for a distant eighth place, while the final point went to Michael Ruben Rinaldi on the GoEleven Ducati in ninth.

Chaz Davies finished outside of the points in 13th on the second works Ducati, having sustained damage during a first-lap incident with Haslam.

Alvaro Bautista was 16th and last of the finishers following an early crash and a trip to the pits that left him three laps down on the second Honda.

Garrett Gerloff (GRT Yamaha) and Eugene Laverty (BMW) were both ruled out of action by crashes in warm-up and neither will take part in Sunday afternoon’s final race.

Race results:

Cla#RiderBikeLapsGap
11 Jonathan ReaKawasaki10 
254 Toprak RazgatliogluYamaha10 0.067
345 Scott ReddingDucati10 0.072
422 Alex LowesKawasaki10 0.205
560 Michael van der MarkYamaha10 1.088
666 Tom SykesBMW10 1.631
776 Loris BazYamaha10 1.849
891 Leon HaslamHonda10 7.145
921 Michael Ruben RinaldiDucati10 7.219
1077 Maximilian ScheibKawasaki10 7.433
1111 Sandro CorteseKawasaki10 9.678
1212 Xavi ForesKawasaki10 10.744
137 Chaz DaviesDucati10 11.124
1464 Federico CaricasuloYamaha10 31.961
1513 Takumi TakahashiHonda10 36.341
1619 Alvaro BautistaHonda7 

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