WorldSBK: Rea fightback hits home
Two race wins and a Superpole victory see the Kawasaki Racing Team gun leading the WSBK title fight after a commanding performance at Donington, UKIt has been a roller-coaster of a season in WorldSBK and now there has been yet another twist in the tale, with Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team) taking the championship lead for the first time with a 24-point advantage after being 61 points down eight races back.
Three from three
Rea was in blistering form at Round 8 of the WorldSBK championship, the Ulsterman winning both races and the Tissot Superpole sprint before an adoring home crowd. A win in Race One propelled the four-time WorldSBK champion to the head of the standings, as he capitalised fully on the crash of Alvaro Bautista (ARUBA.IT Racing – Ducati). Backed up with wins in the Tissot Superpole Race and in Race Two, Rea sees himself back in the lead of the championship.
Race Two started well for Rea, as he launched off pole position and led the field on the run through the opening lap. However, it was not an easy win, as Toprak Razgatlioglu (Turkish Puccetti Racing) raced through on Rea at Turn 11. The two then had a race-long tussle, before Rea took the lead in the second half of the race.
Related reading:
Rea slashes Bautista WorldSBK lead
WorldSBK: Bautista and van der Mark benefit
WorldSBK: Rea dominates Imola
Heading to America
Seeing home Razgatlioglu, Rea took an incredible 78th win of his career to reignite the hopes of the entirety of Northern Ireland and the rest of Great Britain to take the lead of the championship before heading to the USA next weekend.
Rea was elated to find himself back on top of the WorldSBK ladder.
"It's incredible – a similar story to Misano in Race Two with Toprak; he was so strong on the brakes," he said.
"My team gave me a great bike, physically this weekend I felt really good and I was able to extract the best potential from the Kawasaki ZX-10RR.
"We worked step by step throughout the weekend. In FP1 I was a little bit unhappy with our set-up as we were quite far away – 0.9sec from the fastest lap time – but we arrive in the end with three race wins. To be back in the lead of the championship, I can't quite believe it!"
Next up for Rea is the USA and Laguna Seca – a circuit he secured both wins at in 2018 on his way to a fourth WorldSBK crown.
WorldSBK standings (after Round 8)
1. Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki), 376 points
2. Alvaro Bautista (Ducati), 352 pts
3. Michael van der Mark (Yamaha), 206 pts
4. Alex Lowes (Yamaha), 192 pts
5. Leon Haslam (Kawasaki), 187 pts
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