Jonathan Rea: 5 moments that defined a WorldSBK legend

The announcement of Jonathan Rea’s retirement is sure to be one of the standout moments of the motorcycle racing season, let alone WorldSBK’s, but the upcoming conclusion of one of the greatest careers in sports gives us a chance to reflect on some of the moments that created a legend.

Lausitzring 2016

The Lausitzring was not an especially memorable track from a layout perspective – oval road courses rarely are – but the 2016 WorldSBK weekend at the German track brought something different.

Wet weather caused a delayed start to the race, and when things got going it was Rea who stamped his authority.

He started sixth, but led before the end of the first lap from Davide Guigliano. When the Italian crashed, Rea’s advantage became over seven seconds back to second place.

Rea’s winning margin at the end of the race was over nine seconds, and with Chaz Davies – who dominated Race 1 by over 10 seconds – only sixth and Tom Sykes crashing out, it was a big points day for the Northern Irish rider.

It would be Rea’s final win of the season before Davies won back-to-back doubles in Magny-Cours, Jerez, and Lusail, but the Kawasaki rider would nonetheless take the title by over 50 points.

Jonathan Rea is not a rider short of victories in his career, but Lausitzring 2016 stands out above the rest as a very special performance.

2019 title

Picking the best title from six won in succession is not straightforward. Rea’s 2015 title was dominant and a proof of his potential on a package that could challenge for wins every week on any track on the World Superbike calendar.

2016 was more challenging in the second half thanks to Chaz Davies, but Rea held his nerve and got over the line.

2017 was back to utter domination, and it was more of the same in 2018. 2020, too, was a commanding season for Rea even if the title went to the last round.

2019, though, was something different. The domination of Alvaro Bautista in the opening part of the season left him with a 61-point championship lead after the Superpole Race at the Spanish Round in Jerez. Only two rounds later, Rea was 81 points ahead after Race 2 at the US Round.

When Bautista was busy winning in the early races, Rea finished second in all but one race in the first four rounds, that being a third place in Race 2 at Assen.

That meant that when Bautista started to falter in the middle of the season, Rea was close enough to take advantage – he just needed to execute his races.

He did exactly that. After the Spanish Round, Rea won 15 races before the end of the season, taking the title by 165 points in the end.

It was a masterful display of perseverance and patience before Rea’s ruthless winning streak took over in the second half of the year.

Misano 2009

119 WorldSBK wins all started in Misano in 2009 when Rea took his first win in his rookie year.

Rea stepped up to the premier class of production derivative racing in 2009 after a three-win World Supersport season the year before.

Misano marked the eighth round of the 2009 season, and Rea had taken two podiums in the previous two rounds – his first in World Superbike – with his first coming in Race 2 at Kyalami and the second in Race 2 at Miller Motorsports Park.

He was, then, building form heading to the San Marino round, but a ninth in Race 1 didn’t leave much room for optimism in Race 2.

It was something of a turnaround, though, with Rea coming out on top in a late battle with the factory Ducati duo of Michel Fabrizio and Noriyuki Haga, winning over the Italian by just 0.063 seconds.

It was the first of Rea’s 14 wins with Honda, before moving to Kawasaki in 2015 and racking up another 105 in nine seasons. It was the win that set Rea on the path to undisputed greatness in WorldSBK.

MotoGP wildcards

Of course, while the path Rea’s Misano win set him on was ultimately to the top of the pile of WorldSBK greats, it could’ve taken him to MotoGP.

For a while, during his title years, he was linked with a move there simply for his overwhelming dominance in Superbikes – but it never quite happened.

The length of Rea’s time at Honda was partly thanks to the potential for a move to MotoGP, but the closest we ever got to seeing what Rea could do in MotoGP was in 2012 when he replaced Casey Stoner at Repsol Honda.

A test at Aragon was Rea’s only preparation for his first race aboard the RC213V as Dani Pedrosa’s teammate.

That came at Misano, a race which, from a Repsol Honda perspective, is perhaps more memorable for Dani Pedrosa’s retirement on the opening lap when he was taken out by Hector Barbera at turn eight following a back-of-the-grid start due to front brake issues on the grid that forced the HRC title contender to be wheeled off the grid.

From the perspective of the home fans, it’s a memorable race because it was Valentino Rossi’s only dry weather podium aboard the Ducat Desmosedici.

In terms of the championship, it was a big points day for Jorge Lorenzo who won while Pedrosa DNF’d; the Yamaha rider would go on to win the title the next time Pedrosa didn’t finish which came in Australia.

But for Jonathan Rea it was his debut in grand prix racing and he ended it inside the top-10. At the next round, in Aragon, he was seventh – small progress, but he would not have the chance to build on it.

On the one hand, Rea’s MotoGP experience was underwhelming: top-10s on a factory Honda. On the other, he rode solidly and consistently on a technical package he had very limited experience with.

It will never stop being a regret that we never got to see more of Rea in MotoGP and what he could do with a proper crack at grand prix racing, but it’s not something that can diminish his legacy.

Kawasaki switch

It didn’t happen on the track, but Rea’s signature at Kawasaki for the 2015 WorldSBK season set up one of the most dominant periods in the history of any racing series, let alone WorldSBK.

Winning every title from 2015–2020, Rea off the podium on only 14 occasions in those six years and he was almost peerless for the entire period.

Moving in 2015, Rea was joining the strongest team in the paddock with perhaps the strongest bike, since Aprilia moved its factory attention to MotoGP after Sylvain Guintoli won the 2014 title.

It was therefore expected that Rea, who had won 15 races on a Honda CBR1000RR that became increasingly underpowered between 2009 and 2014, would elevate himself into legitimate title contention in 2015 after finishing third in his final Honda season.

But to arrive in a new team and win 14 races in his first season there, clinching the title with two rounds to spare at Jerez, was surely beyond even the most optimistic assumptions about Rea’s prospects in green.

Of course, five more titles followed after that with only small periods of threats to his domination emerging in the second half of 2016 and the beginning of 2019 before Toprak Razgatlioglu and Yamaha finally dethroned Rea in 2021.

Rea’s WorldSBK success also got him a spot on Kawasaki’s Suzuka 8 Hours team, and convinced the Akashi marque to leave the operational side of the factory squad for the Japanese endurance race to the Spanish Provec Racing outfit that still runs Kawasaki’s official WorldSBK effort today – albeit now under Bimota branding.

That was a race that Rea won, together with Leon Haslam and Toprak Razgatlioglu (although the latter famously never rode in the race), in 2019, further cementing Rea’s position as the greatest rider in Kawasaki’s history, a brand with which he became the greatest rider in World Superbike history.