Yamaha World Superbike Team’s Ben Spies does the double again at Donington Park this weekend in the British Round of the World Superbike Championship after taking the lead on the exit of the first corner to win by 6.6 seconds.
It was business as usual for Spies, but a great race for the Brits with six of them finishing in the top ten, three of which were wildcard entries. It was Stiggy Racing’s Honda Leon Haslam who took second place ahead of Michel Fabrizio of Ducati Xerox Team in third to stand on the podium.
Even though Max Biaggi of Aprilia Racing took the lead into the first corner, Spies was already showing him who’s boss as he exited Redgate followed closely by Shinya Nakano of Aprilia Racing.
This looked to be a good race for Nakano until he highsided on lap two putting Noriyuki Haga of Ducati Xerox Team in third, who had also recently moved ahead of Leon Haslam of Stiggy Racing Honda putting him fourth.
As Spies continued to pull away Biaggi on lap three lost the front at Melbourne Loop putting him down in 25th when he rejoined before eventually finish a shocking 21st.  However it will be his rejoining technique that will be the talk of the race, after he remounted the bike he immediately opened up the throttle driving him directly into the path of another rider.  Even though they heavily collided they both were able to continue.
It was lap after lap incidents with Haga on lap four crashing out in a big way at Hollywood where a lap later Carlos Checa also went down.  With the change at the front Michel Fabrizio was up to third behind Haslam.  Fabrizio moved ahead of Haslam but due to a mistake he made on lap nine Haslam took second, which he kept across the finish line.
Not only was it a good start for British rider Haslam, but also for championship regulars Shane Byrne of Team Sterilgarda, Tom Sykes of Yamaha World Superbike Team.  In addition to this the first of the wildcard riders James Ellison of Airwaves Yamaha whos crashed out in race one was running in ninth on the first lap.
Meanwhile current British Superbike championship leader Leon Camier also of Airwaves Yamaha started the huge task of working his way through the grid to finish an astounding sixth place, ahead of his team mate Ellison.  MSS Kawasaki’s Simon Andrews also had his best time on track this weekend after moving up through the pack to take tenth.
Bryne finished just outside the podium in fourth, followed by Sykes and Camier.  Ellison lost out on the last lap to Ryuichi Kiyonari of Ten Kate Honda Racing putting him seventh before Andrews rounded of the top ten.
It was disappointment for Jonathan Rea of HANNspree Ten Kate Honda who slid off on only lap two of the race and Jakub Smrz of Guandalini racing continued with his bad luck with also crashing out quite early on.  Both brothers Carlos Checa of HANNspree Ten Kate Honda and David Checa of Yamaha France GMT 94 IPHONE ended their race prematurely.
Missing from the grid was Jon Hopkins of Stiggy Racing Honda who could not take part in the race due to suffering from injuries.
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