WorldSBK Results - Aragon SP Race | Rea in control as wet tyre woe slows Redding

Jonathan Rea maintained his faultless start to the 2021 WorldSBK Championship with victory in a wet-but -drying 10-lap Superpole Race at Motorland Aragon, adding to a similarly runaway success in race one yesterday.

With the onset of rain bringing an entirely different challenging to Saturday’s sun baked opener, the truncated 10 lap distance and cool temperatures would create a headache for team tacticians as they weighed up wet and intermediate tyre options.

In the end the take up was relatively split down the middle with both Kawasaki riders opting for intermediate rubber, while the factory Ducatis of Scott Redding and Michael Ruben Rinaldi, the Hondas and Tom Sykes chose caution with a set of wets.

However, they soon discovered they were playing it safe to a fault, with the first tell tale signs coming on the opening lap as Redding found himself spending the entire first lap jostling for the lead with both Rea and Alex Lowes, rather than powering into a comfortable lead while the conditions suited him best in the early laps.

He, together with Rea, were lucky not to come down though on lap one when the Ducati rider’s blunt sweep across the bow of the Kawasaki forced the Ulsterman to sit up.

Nevertheless, Rea was quickly back onto Redding’s tale compounding his tyre woes, the six time world champion securing the lead on lap two, an advantage he’d eke out to 3.5secs by the chequered flag.

Lowes picked up a second podium of the weekend to complete a Kawasaki 1-2, with Garrett Gerloff demonstrating his prowess in tricky weather conditions to scythe his way up to third position on the GRT Yamaha, ahead of Chaz Davies, the top four having made the correct tyre choice.

The same could also be said for fifth place finisher Michael van der Mark, who negated his lowly starting position in the mid-pack by gambling on a slick option that had him lapping two seconds faster than anyone else at times on the BMW M 1000 RR.

Toprak Razgatlioglu also went for the intermediate option but could only lift the Yamaha to sixth, ahead of the best wet tyre shod rider in Alvaro Bautista, from a disgruntled Redding in eighth - where he will start the final race of the weekend - and rookie Kohta Nozane landing a third row spot this afternoon in ninth.

Elsewhere, Leon Haslam, Michael Ruben Rinaldi and Andrea Locatelli have work to do lateron after finishing tenth, 11th and 12th on the grid, while Tom Sykes failed to finish and will thus start tenth for the finale.

2021 WorldSBK Aragon - Superpole Race Results