Rea sees off Davies charge in Argentina World Superbike Race 2
Full Argentina World Superbike Race 2 results
Jonathan Rea has capped an impressive Argentina round with his second win of the weekend having sprinted clear of Chaz Davies to cap a controversial World Superbike weekend.
Full Argentina World Superbike Race 2 results
Jonathan Rea has capped an impressive Argentina round with his second win of the weekend having sprinted clear of Chaz Davies to cap a controversial World Superbike weekend.
After the chaos of the opening race which saw just 12 riders start as six others opted to sit it out due to safety concerns, cooler conditions allowed for a smoother day of running at Circuito San Juan Villicum.
With all riders taking part in the earlier Superpole sprint race, there was another full grid for Race 2 which saw Rea head up the early running from Race 1 winner Alvaro Bautista.
Rea, who won the sprint race, made a mistake on Lap 6 under braking at the end of the long back straight to briefly drop down to second place behind Bautista. But the newly-crowned five-time World Superbike champion regained his composure to regain the lead two laps later.
That released the Kawasaki rider while the factory Ducati rider began to fade over the second half of the race with tyre wear.
It saw Bautista’s Aruba.it Racing Ducati team-mate Davies surge up to second place, having struggled down in sixth place after a poor start, but the Welsh rider couldn’t bridge the gap to Rea to see the Northern Irish rider clinch a comfortable victory by over five seconds.
Toprak Razgatlioglu completed a hat-trick of podiums with third place for Puccetti Kawasaki ahead of Pata Yamaha’s Michael van der Mark who got the better of Bautista late on which meant the Spanish rider had to settle for fifth place and 17 seconds behind the winner.
With Alex Lowes in sixth place for Pata Yamaha, Eugene Laverty pulled off a remarkable charge from the back of the grid to take seventh place for Team Goeleven Ducati.
Local favourite Leandro Mercado pulled off a similar surge up the order to take eighth place for Orelac Racing Kawasaki ahead of Pedercini Kawasaki’s Jordi Torres.
Leon Haslam faded as the race progressed in 10th place for Kawasaki in front of Michael Ruben Rinaldi on the Barni Ducati and Loris Baz on the Ten Kate Racing Yamaha.
With Leon Camier in 13th place for Moriwaki Althea Honda, GRT Yamaha pair Marco Melandri and Sandro Cortese rounded out the points places ahead of BMW’s Markus Reiterberger and Moriwaki Althea Honda’s Ryuichi Kiyonari.
Alessandro Delbianco (Althea Honda) and Tom Sykes (BMW) retired with separate technical issues.
