Italian Michael Rinaldi put the soft Pirelli SCX rear tyre to excellent use at Motorland Aragon this afternoon to take his maiden WorldSBK win ahead of reigning champion Jonathan Rea whose title rival Scott Redding crashed out.
Rinaldi put an early move on the Kawasaki man to take the lead and never looked back, taking a six-second victory over the five-time world champion and became the first privateer Ducati rider to win since Sylvain Guintoli eight years ago.
Redding’s crash at turn four means he no-scored which hands Rea a 30-point lead in the championship stakes.
With Rea an eventually comfortable second it was the turn of Chaz Davies to be top factory Panigale rider, in third after his immediate race rival Alvaro Bautista (HRC Honda) crashed out with four to go.
Davies was ten seconds down on Rinaldi – who like Alvaro Bautista last weekend (on the podium on a X-tyre) used the supposed ten lap rear rubber option to take this win.
Redding had in a podium place but fell on lap eight when his front end washed out on him after he was visibly fighting it from turn one.
Michael van der Mark (Pata Yamaha WorldSBK Team) was fourth today, but almost 16 seconds down; Toprak Razgatlioglu (Pata Yamaha WorldSBK Team) fifth and despite all his problems with gastroenteritis, Alex Lowes (Kawasaki Racing Team) moved up to a final sixth place.
Leon Haslam (HRC Honda) was seventh, Eugene Laverty (BMW) eighth, Federico Caricasulo (GRT Yamaha) ninth and Tom Sykes (BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team) – after running off track and losing several places – tenth.
