Chaz Davies dominates at Imola

Ducati factory rider Chaz Davies was unstoppable in round five of the 2017 Superbike World Championship at Imola on May 13-14.

Just like 2016, Davies completed an emphatic double on his Panigale R, and has now moved back up to second in the championship, 1pt ahead of Tom Sykes – but a whopping 74 behind defending champion Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki).

“What a weekend! For the first time this year, I feel we’ve been the benchmark from the beginning," said Davies. "We were able to find our rhythm on Friday, and it sort of snowballed from there. The team has done an awesome job, the bike worked superbly in both races, in different conditions, but today it was quite interesting.

"We got mixed up at the first start, but after the re-start we got a good launch and I was able to make some good moves that put us in a good position. Sykes’ pace was strong, so I had to put my head down to hunt him and, once I caught him, I was able to set my own pace and that was good enough. Thanks to all the Italian fans for showing up this weekend, their push was something special.”

Davies won the opener ahead of Rea and Marco Melandri, and the truncated second race – it was initially red-flagged after an oil spill – from Rea and Sykes.

FULL RESULTS AND STANDINGS

World supersport
Having missed the first two rounds of 2017 due to a training injury and then crashing out on his comeback at Aragon, Turkey's Kenan Sofuoglu (Kawasaki) has now scored two wins in a row, the Imola win allowing him to claw back 5pts on championship leader Lucas Mahias (Yamaha).

Aussie Lachlan Epis (Kawasaki) was 19th.

Round six will be held at Donington from May 26-28.