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Phillip Island WSBK: Rea does double after Davies crash

Reigning World Superbike Champion Jonathan Rea added the Phillip Island race two victory to yesterday’s race one win after title rival Chaz Davies crashed on the final lap, giving the Irishman the breathing space he needed to cross the line for the full 50-point haul.

Ducati’s Davies used everything in his armoury to finish ahead of Rea and had to contend with a top-speed deficit. The Welshman knew he needed to make a break and passed Rea with two laps to go, going past on the brakes into Honda but when they came around to the Gardner Straight, Rea used the Kawasaki’s top speed to re-take the lead.

Rea then made sure Davies had to run a little wide before braking into Honda on the last lap and Davies just asked too much of the front Pirelli and went down, handing Rea back the number one position and promoting Michael Van Der Mark into second place on the Honda Fireblade.

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Van Der Mark had been in the mix for the entire race, grabbing the lead with 11 laps to go as he went under Rea on the brakes into Doohan. The Dutchman remained there until Rea set him up for a slipstream move in the same place but Davies also went through and he was back to third with five laps to go. However, Davies’ error put him back to second.

Van Der Mark’s team-mate Nicky Hayden also benefitted from Davies’ error and moved into third place but had to contend with the attentions of Davide Giugliano. The Italian had a look past Hayden at MG but thought better of it, preferring to drop in front of the former MotoGP World Champion between turns 11 and 12 to take the final podium spot.

Pata Yamaha’s Sylvain Guintoli took advantage of a mistake from Tom Sykes to net fifth place. The Kawasaki man, who said yesterday he was having trouble on the brakes into Honda, ran wide in his attempts to keep Rea behind him and dropped back from the lead into the middle of the top ten. Sykes didn’t have the pace to come back and could no nothing about the pace of Hayden or Guintoli so had to settle for sixth.

Althea BMW’s Jordi Torres fought his way through the pack to take seventh place, getting the better of both Josh Brookes and Markus Reiterberger who had been scrapping for eighth for most of the race. Milwaukee BNW’s Brookes also lost out to the German and finished in ninth pace, one ahead of Davies who recovered to tenth.

Brookes’ team-mate Karel Abraham finished in 11th with Pata Yamaha’s Alex Lowes in 14th. The youngster, who had a crash in morning warm-up, looked to have a problem on the climb up Lukey Heights on lap one and dropped right down the order but then managed to claw his way back for two points. Leon Camier retired the MV Agusta after only a handful of laps.

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