Rea nibbles at Redding WorldSBK lead with Aragon sprint win

WorldSBK Aragon - Superpole Race Results

Jonathan Rea maintained his 100% record of 2020 WorldSBK Superpole Race victories with a resounding success at Motorland Aragon to shave Scott Redding’s newfound championship lead to just two points.

Having been out-gunned by Redding on the Ducati in Saturday’s first race of the weekend around the Spanish venue, Rea didn’t hang around to find out if his rival could get the better of him again by grabbing the lead from turn two and surging away.

By contrast, Redding looked somewhat less frisky as he ceded a two second gap while trying to find a way past Loris Baz, the Frenchman doing well initially to hold steady during the initial laps before being swallowed up by the pack behind.

By the time Redding had found his way through on lap five, Rea was already far enough up the road to control the margin to the chequered flag for his fourth Superpole Race win in succession and his sixth of 2020 in total.

Still, second for Redding in the less lucrative 10-lap encounter means he retains the series lead heading into this afternoon’s crunch Race 2 showdown, which will mark the half-way stage in the season.

Michael van der Mark notched up his fourth podium of the year as the Yamaha contingent appeared more competitive than on Saturday, while a fighting performance by Alvaro Bautista earned Honda its best result of the season - and best since 2018 - in a fine fourth place, setting him up for a podium challenge in Race 2.

Despite failing to make as much headway as he did en route to second in Race 1, Chaz Davies made good gains in the closing stages on the second of the factory Ducatis, grabbing fifth place at the line from Alex Lowes in sixth position.

Toprak Razgatlioglu’s title hopes took another blow with a frustrated run to seventh, ahead of Michael Ruben Rinaldi, getting the better of Baz who, hampered by the lowest top speed of any rider on the grid, dropped from second to ninth in the second half of the race.

Leon Haslam completed the top ten to miss out on the points, ahead of Federico Caricasulo, Xavi Fores, Garrett Gerloff, Max Scheib and Tom Sykes, the latter potentially in line for further sanctions after he was involved in a clumsy collision with Leandro Mercado on lap one.

The Briton ran wide at ‘corkscrew’, sending him across a small gravel trap on the inside of the next left-hander and bouncinh back into the path of the chasing pack, with Mercado unable to avoid the BMW and come down hard.

The Argentinian will miss the final race of the day after being diagnosed with a sprained ankle and suspected cervical strain