Alvaro Bautista wins a World Superbike classic in Estoril 🐼to extend his championship lead over Jonathan Rea.

Starting from pole position for the first time in 2022, Rea made a poor start🌳 as Toprak Razgatlioglu took the lead.

Rea was then relegated to fourth by both Aruba.it Ducati’ꦕs, however, Bautiꦜsta ran slightly wide at turn one which meant Michael Rinaldi had to run off-track. 

Prior to the race getting underway, Rea made a 🍎bold move as he elected to run a development front tyre, while also using the hard rear tyre which was different to main rivals Razgatlioglu and Bautista who were running the SCX option. 

Leandro Mercado had an early crash as he went dow൩n at turn seven on lap one. The MIE Honda rider was unable to continue. 

There was an early attempt from Rea to 𓆏regain the lead, but in typical Razgatlioglu style, the Yamaha rider stayed in front aft🐼er braking later than Rea.

Five corners later and contact was made once again by the two leaders. Rea attempted to cut underneath Razgatlioglu at turn six, but after misjudging the Turkish rider’s speed, Rea ran into the rear of Razgatlioglu - both riders remained aboard their mac﷽hines without any apparent damage. 

Looking to bounce back from his misꦜtake and claw back Razgatlioglu, Rea set a new fastest lap on lap four, while Bautista claimed third 🌠off Andrea Locatelli. 

With a comfortable lead༺, Razgatlioglu then made a mistake of his own as he ran wide at turn three, ไan error that allowed Rea to take the lead. 

No🌜w his turn to stalk Rea, Razgatlioglu was in no mood to wait as he delivered a brilliant late-braking move at turn one to take the lead.&nbs🐼p;

As the lead changed again between Rea and Razgatlioglu at turn one, the battle was helping 💛Bautista slowly gainꩲ time. 

Becoming a firm favourite for both riders, tur🐠n one was the scenꦑe of yet another stunning move as Razgatlioglu came from miles back to overtake Rea, in the meantime, Bautista was half a second faster on lap 10. 

Lap 11ꦜ and Bautista gained🌺 another half second to bring the gap down to 1.5 seconds. 

After another three laps of overtaking between Razgatlioglu and Rea [turn one], Baౠutista was now within a second of the two leaders. 

With Rea now ཧfully under pressure from Bautista, the Kawasaki rider fluffed his lines at turꦦn one and ran wide which allowed the Spaniard into second place. 

Once into second place, Bautista managed to drop Rea as he ᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚslowly closed in on Razgatlioglu. 

But with four laps to go, Razgatlioglu responded in brilliant fashion to extend his lead back t෴o seven tenths. 

A very strong 18th lap saw Baut༒ista gain four tenths along the start-finish straigh😼t, however, the Pata Yamaha rider held strong into turn one. 

In what was looking like an inevitabl♌e change for the lead, Bautista used his incredible straight-line speed to get ahead before turn one, but the reigning world champion came right back at the Spaniard on the brakes to somehow keep the lead.

Just as it appeared a𝐆s though Razgatlioglu put together a perfect last lap, the Turkish star was slow off the final corner as Bautista got the drive in order to pip Razgatlioglu across the line.  

There were early problems for Pedercini🅰 Kawasaki rider Isaac Vinales as his ZX10-RR was being worked on moments before the start. 

Estoril WorldSBK Records

Fastest Lap - Jonathan Rea GBR Kawasaki Racing Team 1:35.346s (2022)

Race Lap Record - Toprak Razgatlioglu TUR Pata Yamaha 1:36.594s (2020) 

2021 Winners 

Race One - Scott Redding GBR Aruba.it Ducati 

Superpole Race - Jonathan Rea GBR Kawasaki Racing Team 

Race Two - Jonathan Rea GBR Kawasaki Racing Team 

Locatelli finishes best of the rest in World Superbike race one at Estoril

After doing his best to compete with💫 Bautists early on, Locatelli started to fall into the clutches of both Team HRC riders Xavi Vierge and Iker Lecuona. 𓆉;

The Italian managed to hold off the tw൲o Spaniards, however, that was not the ca𓄧se for Redding who had been in fifth for much oft he race.

Tyre degradation proved too much as Redding lost signifacant pace during the final fi☂ve laps - eventually finished eighth behind Alex Lowes.&nbs♊p;

Estoril WorldSBK Weekend Schedule

Sunday 

09:00-09:15 WorldSBK Warm-up

11:00 WorldSBK Superpole Race 

14:00 WorldSBK Race 2