Sykes wins as SBK Race 2 is halted early due to rain

Monday 07 May: After rains fell and halted the first attempt at running the opening Superbike World Championship race of the day, with only a couple of laps completed, the attempted restart eventually had to be abandoned. After a track inspection as the rains fell more heavily, it was deemed unsafe to continue.

Tom Sykes (Kawasaki Racing Team) won the only race of the day at Monza, a contest which was halted at half race distance due to a fresh fall of rain, meaning that half points were awarded.

Sykes was peerless out front in any case, winning by a margin of 9.709 seconds from Leon Haslam (BMW Motorrad Motorsport) and with Eugene Laverty (Aprilia Racing Team) third. Marco Melandri (BMW Motorrad Motorsport) was a close fourth and another local great, Max Biaggi (Aprilia Racing Team), was fifth. From second to seventh place was covered by just over a second in a close contest behind Sykes.

In the championship Biaggi now has 97.5 points, Carlos Checa (Althea Racing Ducati) has 95.5 after finishing seventh today, and Sykes has 91.5.

Supersport

Jules Cluzel (PTR Honda) won what was only his fourth ever Supersport race, in wet conditions at Monza. He finally held off an exciting late challenge from Sam Lowes (Bogdanka PTR Honda) who passed him to the final corner, but was forced wide to allow Cluzel to duck inside and claim the prize. Some way back, Kenan Sofuoglu (Kawasaki DeltaFin Lorenzini) was a safe third, ahead of the impressive wet-weather abilities of Imre Toth (Racing Team Toth). Fifth was wild card rider Stefano Cruciani (Puccetti Racing Kawasaki Itali). In the championship, Sofuoglu leads by ten points from Lowes, 61 to 51, with Fabien Foret (Kawasaki Intermoto Step) only 12th today and now third overall on 49 points.

600 Superstock

Riccardo Russo (Team Italia FMI) won the 600 Superstock class in fully wet conditions on his R6, after a deluge of rain forced the start of the race to be put back as full rain tyres were fitted. It was his second race win of the year. Gauthier Duwelz (Team MTM Racing) was second on another Yamaha with the first Honda home being the EAB Ten Kate Junior Team CBR600RR of Bastien Chesaux. Michael van der Mark, Chesaux's team-mate, was fourth and only 3.5 seconds from Russo. In the championship Russo has 61 points, van der Mark 54 and Nacho Calero Perez (Team Trasimeno Yamaha), who was sixth at Monza, has 50 points.

Copy and pics courtesy of World SBK.