If anyone wanted to win in today’s WSBK first race of round three that was Jonathan Rea.
The Castrol Honda rider was racing in front of fans and on his team’s home circuit at Assen and took his third consecutive victory at the historic Dutch track after last year’s double win and the seventh of his career.
Rea was very aggressive in the first part of the race where he started in fifth, but put in some daring and hard passes on reigning World Champion Max Biaggi, but as soon as he got the lead on lap 3, kept a cool head on his shoulders, riding fast and with almost no mistakes, kept the Aprilia Alitalia rider at bay until the chequered flag.
The Roman Emperor took second followed by Carlos Checa.
The Spaniard had a good start, but halfway through the race seemed to fade letting several of the initially tightly knit group overtake him, but the Althea rider fought his way back to regain the 3rd spot on the podium.
Marco Melandri finished fourth after a bad start, but the Italian had an excellent race pace that let him overtake fellow Italian Michel Fabrizio, who after a bang up charge from 13th came in 5th, while Troy Corser took 6th.
Eugene Laverty was 7th after riding as high as 3rd before his tires gave out.
Ruben Xaus inherited the 8th spot after Jakub Smrz highsided in the last chicane and his team mate Sylvain Guintoli who was tailing him had no where to go and crashed directly into his team mate’s fallen Ducati, with both riders going into the gravel pit, and Smrz ended up limping and the French rider holding his already fractured hand.
Ninth went to Ayrton Badovini and tenth to Mark Aitchison, the Australian taking his first top ten position in WSBK’s for Team Pedercini.
The first race only saw 14 finishers, Noriyuki Haga had to retire after a small rock perforated his Aprilia’s radiator.
Chris Vermeulen also had to retire, as did Leon Camier who had technical problems with his RSV4 at the starting grid and later had to retire on lap 17.
Roberto Rolfo crashed out with his Kawasaki, but the remaing Kawasaki’s weren’t much better after having made the wrong tire choice and going out with the softer option.
Tom Sykes ran as high as third but faded to 14th while Joan Lascorz managed an 11th place finish.
WSBK Assen Race 1 Results:01- Jonathan Rea – Castrol Honda – Honda CBR 1000RR – 22 laps in 35’46.
48602- Max Biaggi – Aprilia Alitalia Racing Team – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 0.
73903- Carlos Checa – Althea Racing – Ducati 1198 – + 3.
57204- Marco Melandri – Yamaha World Superbike Team – Yamaha YZF R1 – + 9.
50805- Michel Fabrizio – Team Suzuki Alstare – Suzuki GSX-R 1000 – + 9.
89206- Troy Corser – BMW Motorrad Motorsport – BMW S1000RR – + 11.
12007- Eugene Laverty – Yamaha World Superbike Team – Yamaha YZF R1 – + 15.
23508- Ruben Xaus – Castrol Honda – Honda CBR 1000RR – + 30.
08109- Ayrton Badovini – BMW Motorrad Italia – BMW S1000RR – + 32.
07110- Mark Aitchison – Team Pedercini – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 35.
00011- Joan Lascorz – Kawasaki Racing Team – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 43.
28712- Leon Haslam – BMW Motorrad Motorsport – BMW S1000RR – + 45.
28913- Barry Veneman – BMW Motorrad Italia – BMW S1000RR – + 45.
29814- Tom Sykes – Kawasaki Racing Team – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 50.
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