Aruba Ducati’s Marco Melandri bounced back from his last-lap crash at Misano yesterday to take victory in today’s second WorldSBK race with Jonathan Rea holding off Kawasaki team-mate Tom Sykes for second place.
The little Italian spent a majority of the clash behind Althea BMW’s Jordi Torres but managed to sneak past the Spaniard with nine laps left and didn’t look back. Torres had the pace to keep Melandri in sight and looked likely to bag second but with four laps left to run, his S1000RR ceased to function.
Torres breakdown, possibly in both senses, promoted reigning champion Rea to second but Sykes had kept something in his pocket for the final two laps after Rea had pushed past at turn two with seven left. The Huddersfield man closed Rea down on the last lap but just couldn’t find the final two-tenths he needed for second.
Michael Van Der Mark recovered from his faulty tyre crash yesterday to take fourth place but it was another crash for team-mate Alex Lowes. The pair were circulating together after going past Eugene Laverty’s Milwaukee Aprilia and Lowes just asked too much of his front at turn two, sliding into the gravel.
Laverty picked up fifth place as a result of other riders’ incidents and his team-mate Lorenzo Savadori was one place and six seconds further back. Raffaele De Rosa, on the second Althea bike, picked up seventh, Randy Krummenacher eighth with Tati Mercafo and Stefan Bradl completing the top ten.
Leon Camier was forced to retire with a technical problem with seven left while it was heartbreak for Xavi Fores who also retired from second place after only five laps.
