Bautista matches Hodgson’s historic nine in Aragon sweep
Full WorldSBK race two results from Aragon
Alvaro Bautista has equalled Neil Hodgson’s feat of nine consecutive wins at the start of a World Superbike championship to take a third hat-trick of victories, as Jonathan Rea claimed second place seeing off Chaz Davies.
The Aruba.it Racing Ducati rider produced a copy of his previous two wins at Aragon from earlier this weekend by bolting from pole position and clearing off at the front.
Full WorldSBK race two results from Aragon
Alvaro Bautista has equalled Neil Hodgson’s feat of nine consecutive wins at the start of a World Superbike championship to take a third hat-trick of victories, as Jonathan Rea claimed second place seeing off Chaz Davies.
The Aruba.it Racing Ducati rider produced a copy of his previous two wins at Aragon from earlier this weekend by bolting from pole position and clearing off at the front.
Bautista’s ninth straight win sees him match Hodgson’s same achievement from the 2003 World Superbike championship, while the win also marks Ducati’s 350th win in the series.
Rea was involved in another race-long battle for second place – this time against his Kawasaki team-mate Leon Haslam, Pata Yamaha’s Alex Lowes and Davies – but planned his race to preserve his tyre life for a late-race charge passing all three rivals over the final few laps.
The reigning World Superbike champion forced Davies into a mistake on the final lap, with the Welsh rider running wide at Turn 1, to skate past and defend from any late attacks to take second place.
With Davies having to settle for third place he did avoid any last-lap moves from Haslam, as Lowes faded late on in fifth place.
Eugene Laverty bounced back from his race one frustrations to take sixth place for Team Go Eleven Ducati having beaten local rider Jordi Torres on the Pedercini Kawasaki.
Michael van der Mark charged from the back of the grid to eighth place for Pata Yamaha, having been taken off by Michael Ruben Rinaldi in the sprint race, with the Italian rider also recovering through the field to take ninth place on the Barni Ducati.
Sandro Cortese rounded out the top 10 on the GRT Yamaha, beating team-mate Marco Melandri, with Tom Sykes struggling to replicate his race one pace for BMW in 12th place.
Leon Camier led home the Moriwaki-Althea Honda charge in 13th with Markus Reiterberger (BMW) and Ryuichi Kiyonari (Honda) completing the points places.
Alessandro Delbianco (Honda) and Toprak Razgatlioglu (Puccetti Kawasaki) both failed to finish due to mechanical issues, while Leandro Mercado missed both of Sunday’s races for Orelac Kawasaki with a wrist injury.
