Two more podiums for Rea

It is now obvious that the Superbike World Championship title will be decided between Alvaro Bautista, Jonathan Rea and Toprak Razgatlioglu. These three men, who have been taking podiums since the beginning of the year, are now clearly separated at the top of the general rankings. At the Most circuit, Jonathan Rea finished the first race just off the podium before the next day taking a second and a third place behind the reigning world champion Razgatlioglu. The Kawasaki rider took the Superpole for the third time this season and fought hard for the win in Race 1 before running into the same problems he encountered two weeks earlier at Donington. “I backed off on the last few laps as my braking deteriorated," commented the six-times world champion. “I was having trouble slowing my bike down and was afraid of tangling with an opponent as we fought it out." 

Which is how Redding managed take the third step of the podium off him in the last kilometres. The next day, Rea came close to victory in the Sprint Race. "I tried everything in the last corner to pass Toprak but he changed his trajectory to defend his line and that forced me to move over, making it impossible to overtake him." In the final race of the weekend, the Kawasaki rider lost time in the opening laps before shaking off Bassani and Rinaldi. “Toprak and Alvaro had by then pulled out a lead and in trying to catch them I accelerated tyre wear," admitted Rea. “At the end of the race I was suffering some dribble and was sliding a lot. The bike became hard to ride and I had to drop my pace." For Lowes, the Czech weekend went much worse. Suffering from intestinal problems, the Briton had to settle for ninth place on Saturday afternoon. After a crash at Turn 10 in the Sprint Race on Sunday morning, he decided not to start the final race in order to save himself for the Suzuka Eight Hour race in Japan this weekend. He is now eighth overall.