Aprilia’s Sylvain Guintoli put behind his obvious disappointment of failing to come away from race one without the win, to fight back to take the spoils in the final World Superbike race in Phillip Island. But the England based Frenchman had to contend with rear tyre wear for the majority of the opening session.
Guintoli led the pack at the beginning stages of the race one, however this cost him wear on his tyre so that in the final laps he had nothing left on the rear to be able to fend off the attack by Voltcom Suzuki’s Eugene Laverty.
In race two Guintoli led for the first part and after being overtaken by fellow leaders Kawasaki's Loris Baz and Laverty, but he took back the lead on the twelfth lap. Two laps later an engine failure for Laverty - riding second at the time behind he French Aprilia rider, caused a consequent oil spill on the track, forcing Laverty to withdraw and the marshals to suspend the race. This meant that the finishing order was decided by the last lap completed which had Guintoli winning in front of Baz and Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes.
With this performance the Frenchman provided a repeat of last year's success, thanks to his third place in race one, and winning race two, and it puts him in the lead for the rider’s championship.
“In race one maybe I had a little too much faith. I started off strong and toward the end I lost the right feeling with my rear tyre. The conditions were much different than they had been over the last few days but we did a good job anyway,” said Guintoli.
“In the second race I tried to look after my tyre and it worked. If I think about everything that happened during the winter I can't help but be pleased with our weekend. I'm finally back on the top step of the podium. I want to thank the guys who looked after me during my recovery. I'm pretty tired now but I'll have a month to recover before the next round”.
