Aruba.it Ducati’s Chaz Davies put in another master class performance from sixth on the grid to take his eighth win of the 2016 WorldSBK season, leading home both Kawasakis in Jerez.
It was a fast and furious start to proceedings at Jerez. Jonathan Rea launched ahead of teammate Tom Sykes from second on the grid into Turn 1, but the Yorkshireman was quick to retake the lead at Turn 6.
Behind, Davies and Pata Yamaha’s Alex Lowes battled over third place. The Ducati rider had opted for the softer front tyre whilst Lowes went with the soft rear, and both were keen to use their grip advantage to close in on the Kawasakis.
Davies got the upper hand on the Yamaha rider at the final corner at the end of the first lap and charged after the warring Rea and Sykes ahead of him. The Northern Irishman swooped past his teammate through the fast Turn 7, but this lost him momentum through the next two corners and allowed Sykes and Davies to move ahead of him.
Honda’s Nicky Hayden, who also started on the soft rear tyre, had recovered from a bad to start and was back up to fifth when Lowes crashed out at Turn 5 on the third lap.
Davies hit the front at the end of lap four and began to ease away from Sykes, who in turn was keeping his teammate at bay. Hayden put Rea under some pressure mid-race, but the challenge quickly faded as the American’s rear tyre began to lose grip.
Despite running the softer front tyre, Davies’ pace never dropped and he cruised home to close the gap to Sykes in the standings to 28 points, the Yorkshireman closing down his disadvantage to Rea to 44 points. With both KRT riders completing the podium, Kawasaki become Manufacturers’ Champions for 2016.
Elsewhere, Hayden ran into some serious grip issues in the final laps and had teammate Michael van der Mark bearing down on him. The Dutchman pushed for all he was worth but missed out on fourth by just four hundredths of a second. Sylvain Guintoli, on the sole remaining Pata Yamaha, completed the top six.
Leon Camier put in another strong race on the MV Agusta to claim seventh ahead of Jordi Torres, Markus Reiterberger and Josh Brookes. Alex De Angelis held Roman Ramos at bay for 11th, whilst his Ioda teammate Lorenzo Savadori struggled to 13th. Ant West recovered from a fall on lap three to finish 14th, and Peter Sebestyen took his first point of the season in 15th.
Gianluca Vizziello wasn’t far behind in 16th, with Dominic Schmitter and Karel Pesek the last of the classified runners. Matthieu Lussiana joined Lowes on the sidelines, along with Saeed Al Sulaiti and Luca Scassa. Davide Giugliano and Xavie Fores also dropped out of the race, the pair suffering identical front-end folds at the first corner on the second lap.
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