Yakhnich Yamaha’s Sam Lowes dominated yet another World Supersport race, but this time it was at the Nurburgring. He was able to lead for most of the race, with MAHI Racing’s Fabien Foret crossing the finishing line in second. Scottish lad, DMC Lorenzini’s Kev Coghlan snatched his first podium of the year ending the session in third.
Lowes did not lead from the start, that honour went to reigning champ, MAHI Racing’s Kenan Sofuoglu. The Turkish rider stormed to the front on the opening lap, followed by team-mate Fabien Foret. But Lowes had an average start and got off the line in fourth, behind his Russian team-mate Vladimir Leonov, but quickly made his way through to third.
Then on lap three, Lowes made a move on Foret to go second at Advan-Bogen, then the Derby lad had Sofuoglu in his sights and made a move on turn 12 that stuck with seventeen laps to go, and at the front of the pack was where the Brit remained till he crossed the finishing line. The rider came away with his sixth win of the season, and now leads the championship by 54 points.
Sofuoglu was never too far behind and matched the pace of Lowes, firstly the Lincolnshire lad broke the lap record that was previously held by Cal Crutchlow, then minutes later the Kawasaki racer went even quicker and smashed the lap record with a 1’58.072. But Sofuoglu’s luck did run out after he crashed at turn 2 on lap ten, leaving Lowes to storm ahead.
Foret was never able to close the gap on the Yamaha at the front and on the final lap; Lowes crossed the finishing line with a seven second advantage. Elsewhere there were mini-battles breaking out all over the German track, most notably involving the British riders in series.
During the first half of the race Coghlan was in the mid pack, but on lap ten pushed his way to sixth and was involved in a fight for fifth place with Marino, but the rider could not hold off the Perthshire lad, and then he had to contend with Pata Honda’s Lorenzo Zanetti who was in fourth.
Coghlan made his move on the Italian with three laps remaining on turn 1 to go third, and after some small mistakes by the Honda rider the Scot cemented his place on the third step of the rostrum and in doing so clinched his first World Supersport podium.
ParkinGO’s Christian Iddon started off strongly and was in contention for a top ten finish. The Stockport lad was unable to hold off Pata Honda’s Michael Van der Mark, but on lap thirteen made his way to eighth.
But a mistake with four laps to go meant the youngster found himself in the gravel and fell back outside the top ten and crossed the line in twelfth, ahead of Marino and Kawasaki’s Intermoto rider Davide Salom and Rivamoto’s Jack Kennedy.
The Dubliner had a poor start but pulled his way back into the top ten on the penultimate lap, and fought off Salom to end the race in eighth. Former Moto3 rider, Danny Webb finished his first World Superbike race for his PTR Honda team in 23rd place.
