Although victory continues to elude him, second for Corser still marks his seventh podium of the season, while the race also saw him complete the extraordinary milestone of 6,000 World Superbike laps.

For Biaggi, his race went on to take an eventful turn when he slipped into the clutches of sparring partner Fabrizio, the factory rider harrying his countryman over the final few laps before finally overtaking in the sweetest place – the final corner of the final lap.

Fabrizio was lucky to have the chance to challenging Biaggi though as he was tailed nearly all the way by Ryuichi Kiyonari, who gamely battled his way back up the order following a poor start. Pulling off a number of fine overtaking moves, including one on Fabrizio, Kiyonari eventually settled for one of his best results of the season in fifth.

Like Biaggi, Neukirchner seemed to struggle with his tyres in the latter stages as he dropped down to an eventual seventh place, behind Noriyuki Haga, the Japanese rider having to battle up to sixth from 12th on the grid.

Indeed, Suzuki had a tough race all round after Yukio Kagayama finished in a rather unspectacular ninth, while Fonsi Nieto threw away a good result with a fall in the latter stages.

By contrast, Honda showed improved form with Carlos Checa coming home eighth, while Kenan Sofuoglu earned the status of the 'biggest mover' by finishing in tenth from 26th on the grid.

That was enough to place him ahead of Karl Muggeridge, Shinichi Nakatomi and Niccoló Canepa, who looked very race rusty when he suffered a poor start and continued to fall further away as the race progressed.

A recovering Nieto and Gregorio Lavilal rounded out the points positions.

Elsewhere, home favourite Jakub Smrz got no further than the third lap when he was involved in a clash with Regis Laconi's Kawasaki, while Lorenzo Lanzi and Ruben Xaus were other riders to miss out on the chance of points following a respective fall and technical woe.