Latest 2019 WorldSBK Standings (After Round 6 of 13)
Jonathan Rea closes the gap on Alvaro Bautista despite finishing off the podium twice in one weekend for first time since 2017.
Latest 2019 World Superbike Championship Standings
For all of his dominance this weekend, the fact Alvaro Bautista leaves Round 6 of the 2019 World Superbike Championship with a trimmed points' lead seems a bit of a cruel injustice.
Nevertheless, as the man himself pointed out, it could have been worse as Rea suffered his 'worst' weekend in some years after struggling to match Ducati and - unusually - Yamaha's pace even before he became embroiled in that controversial clash with Alex Lowes. Differece was, Rea stayed up (just) meaning a 4-4-2 trumps a 1-1-DNF by two points.
As such, the championship lead is down from 43 to 41 points heading to Misano, where the Kawasaki is expected to perform better than at a scorching Jerez.
The big winner over the weekend should have been Pata Yamaha as a whole but it was Michael van der Mark that ended up leaving Spain with the biggest smile after two already impressive second place results were followed up by a brilliant win in race three. A Bautista-less race it may have been, but beating Rea in a fair fight will be seen as a satisfying outcome.
By contrast, team-mate Alex Lowes endured a crushing weekend that went downhill the moment he was biffed off by Rea at the end of race one. Crashes in races two and three threatened see Lowes leave with a shoulder injury but no points, though he did recover two digits for a 14th place finish two laps in arrears. Either way, van der Mark has come from behind to suddenly be 46 points clear in third.
Marco Melandri enjoyed a positive weekend, at least up until his collision with Chaz Davies in race three, with his first podiums since round one to scale to sixth overall. Meanwhile, a second rostrum to two events means Toprak Razgatlioglu has jumped from 11th to seventh in just five races.
Further back, Loris Baz got points on the board - including a top ten finish - in his first weekend for the reformed Ten Kate SBK team, while Tommy Bridewell can call himself a WorldSBK top ten finisher for the first time too. Making his WorldSBK debut this weekend, ex-MotoGP rider Yuki Takahashi is also on the board thanks to a 13th place finish in race three.
