Czech WorldSBK, Superpole Race: Razgatlioglu Overcomes Ducati Challenge for 50th Win

07/21/2024 08:58 AM

Autodrom Most hosts round six of the 2024 Superbike World Championship, the Czech WorldSBK. Toprak Razgatlioglu arrives to the Czech Round with the championship lead, and off the back of two consecutive trebles, and the Turkish rider was fastest in Superpole to take his third straight pole position, which he converted to victory in both Race 1 and the Superpole Race.

Race 2

Toprak Razgatlioglu secured his third successive triple victory in WorldSBK, beating Nicolo Bulega by over three seconds.

It was Bulega who grabbed the early lead, and it took Razgatlioglu until lap five to find his way to the front. Once he did, though, Bulega had no response. He was fast enough to be comfortable in second, but not fast enough to put Razgatlioglu in discomfort in front. The same 1-2 as in Donington, Bulega is proving that, at least on Sundays, he is the closest rider to Razgatlioglu, the clear benchmark in WorldSBK, at the present moment.

While Razgatlioglu was streaking to his 51st career win, his former teammate Andrea Locatelli was taking his first podium since Australia in third place. He passed Michael van der Mark to achieve it, with the Dutchman ending up fifth, having been passed by Remy Gardner, too.

Jonathan Rea was sixth, ahead of Michael Ruben Rinaldi, Andrea Iannone, Alex Lowes, and Iker Lecuona who rounded out the top 10.

A first turn crash involving Alvaro Bautista and Danilo Petrucci saw the Spaniard pick up his second non-score of the day, with Petrucci out in the incident, too. The crash forced Andrea Iannone into avoiding action, sending him down the escape road at the first chicane, leaving him in recovery mode for the rest of the race which he finished in eighth.

Alex Lowes' ninth place was easier to explain: a jump start resulted in a double-long-lap penalty.

Superpole Race

Toprak Razgatlioglu secured his ninth consecutive WorldSBK race win in the Superpole Race at Most, after overcoming an early challenge from the factory Ducati riders.

Razgatlioglu made the holeshot, but Nicolo Bulega made his way to the front towards the end of the first lap, before Alvaro Bautista then took second place off the #54 at the penultimate turn.

It took Razgatlioglu until lap three to get back to the front, by which time Alex Lowes had joined the front group.

Although the Ducati's had taken the fight to Razgatlioglu early on, they had no answer for his pace once he got back to the lead, and while he was unable to streak away from the field as he did in the Superpole Race at last weekend's UK Round, he was able to extend a gap of over one second by the start of the final lap.

By then, Bautista was all over Bulega for second place, the pair having now dropped Lowes, and second place was all there was to fight for. A lunge from Bautista into turn one forced Bulega over the gravel and left the Spaniard over the kerb on the outside of turn one and into the gravel, where he crashed.

Fortunately for Bulega, Lowes wasn't close enough to take advantage of the first turn incident between himself and his teammate, allowing him to hang onto second place, while Lowes took an opportunistic third place.

Bautista's demise promoted everyone behind, most crucially for Jonathan Rea, who went from 10th to ninth, securing a third-row start for Race 2 after starting 15th for Race 1 and the Superpole Race. Further forwards, Danilo Petrucci was fourth, ahead of Remy Gardner, Andrea Locatelli, Andrea Iannone, and Michael van der Mark, with whom Rea was battling for most of the race over the ninth place he was eventually handed by Bautista. Michael Ruben Rinaldi completed the top 10, while Bautista didn't finish, remounting after the crash but pitting at the end of the last lap.

A crash on lap two for Sam Lowes also took out Scott Redding. It was a huge crash for Lowes, which Redding was unfortunate to get caught up in, and which sent the Marc VDS Ducati rider to the medical centre. Lowes was shown on the TV broadcast to be sitting up and mobile in the gravel trap. After the race, Lowes was diagnosed with a nondisplaced fracture of the left collarbone and thus declared unfit, ruling him out of Race 2.

Race 1

Toprak Razgatlioglu stormed to his eighth successive WorldSBK victory in Race 1 at Most, winning by over five seconds.

Razgatlioglu, who started from pole position, made the holeshot and immediately began to pull away. By lap two he had one second, a few laps later that was doubled, and with a few laps to go it was over seven seconds. A wheelie from the exit of the final corner until the finish line meant his margin was reduced to 5.7 seconds at the flag, but there was never any doubt about the result from the first lap.

Behind, the battle for second was initially between three Ducatis, but as the race went on that number reduced to two. The pattern of Nicolo Bulega's season, with the exception of is WorldSBK debut in Australia, has been that his first race has been blighted by late race pace struggles, and in the Sunday races he has improved. So far in Most, that pattern is continuing, as it was the #11 that dropped out of the battle for second from mid-race onwards and began slipping back to sixth place.

Bulega's departure from the podium fight left Danilo Petrucci and Andrea Iannone to decide second and third place between them. The two were quite even on pace, but Iannone seemed to have a little bit more at the end. However, a mistake at turn one on the penultimate lap gave Petrucci a big enough gap to manage until the end.

Petrucci took second for his first podium of the season, while Iannone secured his first top three finish since the Catalan Round back in March.

Alvaro Bautista had better pace than both of them at the end, but he lost too much time in the beginning of the race. He started 10th, having picked up a three-place grid penalty, but was fifth after the first few corners. From there, though, he slipped backwards, and battled with Alex Lowes and Remy Gardner as the three aforementioned Ducati riders pulled away. By the time Bautista's pace recovered, at around half-distance, he had time to get to fourth place - passing Gardner, seeing Lowes fall off behind him, and taking advantage of the fading Bulega, too - but no further.

Gardner took fifth place, comfortably finishing as the best Yamaha rider, ahead of Bulega, who lost nine seconds to the two riders he was fighting with for the podium by the end. Andrea Locatelli was seventh, Garrett Gerloff eighth, Michael van der Mark ninth, and Jonathan Rea completed the top 10 after a disappointing race - considering his competitive speed on Friday - which included a trip through the long-lap loop for cutting the first chicane.

Superpole

Toprak Razgatlioglu took a sensational pole position with a new lap record of the Autodrom Most circuit at the Czech WorldSBK.

Razgatlioglu was almost 0.7 seconds clear of the field in Superpole, beating the new lap record he set in Saturday morning's FP3 by a similar amount. Like the WorldSBK UK Round last weekend, the Turkish rider is in formidable form in the Czech Republic.

Andrea Iannone, ambitiously using Razgatlioglu as a marker, was the #54's closest challenger on his first visit to the Czech track. The Italian qualified second, ahead of Alex Lowes who completed the front row.

Nicolo Bulega had his worst qualifying of the season in fourth, and will be joined on row two by Remy Gardner and Danilo Petrucci, the latter feeling as though he'd been blocked by Alvaro Bautista on the final lap of his first run.

As for the reigning champion himself, he missed the front two rows yet again with his seventh-placed qualifying, ahead of Garrett Gerloff, Andrea Locatelli, and Michael Ruben Rinaldi who completed the top 10. Rinaldi will be joined on row four by Scott Redding and Sam Lowes.

FP2

Toprak Razgatlioglu repeated his time-topping performance of Friday morning on Friday afternoon at Most for the Czech WorldSBK, but his advantage shrank.

Despite improving his own time by over 0.4 seconds between FP1 and FP2, Razgatlioglu's advantage was reduced from almost 0.3 seconds in FP1 to only 0.103 seconds in FP2. The Turkish rider's closest rival was now Alvaro Bautista, not Remy Gardner, and the reigning champion was the only rider other than Razgatlioglu to lap in the 1:31s.

Behind Bautista was Jonathan Rea, who completed a nostalgic top three although he missed a sub-1:32, while Alex Lowes and Nicolo Bulega completed the top five.

Danilo Petrucci was sixth, ahead of Remy Gardner, Michael van der Mark, Andrea Locatelli, and Andrea Iannone who rounded out the top 10.

Technical issues for Michael Ruben Rinaldi's #21 Motocorsa Ducati meant the Italian did not set a time.

FP1

Toprak Razgatlioglu was fastest in WorldSBK FP1 at the Czech Round, finishing ahead of Remy Gardner.

The Turkish rider laid down his benchmark on just his second flying lap of the session, and was still the only rider in the 1:31s by the end of FP1.

For most of the session, Razgatlioglu was over 0.5 seconds clear of the field, but by the end Gardner had got to within 0.3 seconds of the 2021 champion. Alvaro Bautista, too, was within 0.3 seconds, while Danilo Petrucci and Scott Redding in fourth and fifth were the last riders to be withing 0.5 seconds by the end.

Jonathan Rea was briefly second-fastest, but dropped to sixth at the end, ahead of Nicolo Bulega, Iker Lecuona, Alex Lowes, and Michael Ruben Rinaldi who completed the top 10.

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