Great show of strength from Alvaro Bautista in race 1 at Misano. After a fierce fight with Rea and Razgatlioglu, the Spaniard stayed behind the six-time world champion for a few laps, only to overtake him on lap thirteen. Once in the lead, he set a pace that the Kawasaki rider was unable to follow and by establishing the new record for the Romagna track, in 1'34.221, he ended up leading his Ducati to the highest step of the podium, with 5 seconds ahead of the Northern Irishman.
But the news of the day, beyond the fantastic race of the Ducati rider, is the sensational retirement of Toprak Razgatlioglu, betrayed by a technical problem, probably electronic, on his Yamaha seven laps from the finish, so that he was third. From now on, the Turkish driver is 77 points behind Alvaro Bautista, and 55 behind Jonathan Rea. The fight for the title is really very difficult for him.
The retirement of Toprak Razgatlioglu facilitated the first podium of the season for Michael Ruben Rinaldi, who fought until halfway through the race with Axel Bassani, before taking the advantage over the Motocorsa Racing rider, who still finished the race in a very good fourth place.
Good race also for Alex Lowes, fifth ahead of Andrea Locatelli. In the home race, the rider from Bergamo certainly hoped to do something better, but given what the other Yamaha riders are doing, he can be satisfied with the final sixth position.
Xavi Virgo is seventh and first of the Honda riders, also because Iker Lecuona was the author of a catastrophic start which then forced him to come back which ended in ninth position. Garrett Gerloff slips between the two CBRs, eighth. Tenth position for Scott Redding, after a race without infamy and without praise.
Roberto Tamburini claimed his best finish in the category with an 11th place ahead of Kohta Nozane, the latter having got off to a good start and worked his way into the top 10 but fell back as the race progressed before falling back in 12th place. Eugene Laverty takes the points for 13th after overtaking teammate Loris Baz in the closing stages, while Luca Bernardi also overtook the French driver to finish 14the. Loris Baz takes the point of fifteenth place, after struggling in the final laps.
Other bad news on the French side, Christophe Ponsson was the first to abandon the race after falling during the third lap. After a visit to the Medical Center, a fracture of the right clavicle and a whiplash were diagnosed, his Weekend ends there.
The pace of the race was frenetic, and for good reason: the winner rode nine seconds faster than last year's counterpart race!
WSBK Misano: Ranking of Race 1
Credit Ranking & photos: World SBK
