Sometimes you can’t see the forest from the trees, and Aragon’s Race 2 was a good example of that in World Superbike. The championship standings have been dominated by Jonathan Rea all season, but this was the fourth time that the reigning world champion was pushed to the limit on race day this season.
With Rea having started the day with a 100% winning record in 2017, the pressure was on the rest of the field to break his stranglehold on the series. Ultimately, it came down to Jonathan Rea versus Chaz Davies, as had been expected, with the duo renewing their intense rivalry from 24-hours earlier.
Five wins from five for Johnathan Rea, and his championship lead extended to 47 points meant that Race 1 at Aragon was mission accomplished for the reigning world champion.
A penultimate lap crash for Chaz Davies robbed the Spanish crowd of a last lap shootout, but in the preceding 17 laps, the crowd was treated to a fantastic scrap.
Davies, the favorite at the start of the weekend, converted his pole position into an early lead, but with Rea biting at his heels the Kawasaki rider was able to take the lead on numerous occasions.
Ultimately Davies rebuffed all overtaking moves from Rea by immediately retaking the build, but the die was cast for what would happen at the end of the race.
It’s early days for the 2017 World Superbike season, but already plenty of people are crowning Jonathan Rea as a three-time champion. To anyone thinking that with 22 races remaining that the championship has been sown up, it would be wise not to count any chickens just yet.
Rea has most certainly been the class of the field so far in Australia and Thailand, but they are two tracks that the Kawasaki rider had been heavily favored to win at. Phillip Island is a wide-open race to open the year, but Rea has traditionally been a force at the Australian circuit.
Likewise in three years of visiting Thailand he has won five races. There’s a lot that can be taken from the opening three rounds of the year, but it will take a couple of European rounds before a clear picture truly emerges.
Jonathan Rea maintained his 100% record to start the 2017 World Superbike season, and in doing so the Northern Irishman became the first rider since Neil Hodgson in 2003 to open his campaign with four consecutive victories.
The Rea has made the Chang International Circuit his own over the course of the last three years, and this weekend was no exception.
A dominant lights-to-flag victory on Saturday was followed by a tremendous opening lap in Race 2, which saw him slice through the field to be in second position by the end of the opening tour.
Jonathan Rea claimed a dominant victory at the Chang International Circuit, with the reigning World Champion setting a searing pace en route to his third victory in a row.
When he arrived in parc ferme after Race 1, the Northern Irishman’s emotions were clear for all to see as he celebrated his 41st WorldSBK victory.
“I felt really good and quite calm, my guys gave me a really good bike again and that was my plan,” said Rea. “We had a really good pace, but Chaz also had a very fast pace, as did Marco, so I had to ride away into T1 to make the holeshot, I wanted to get my head down in T1 and I did it.”
“I managed to get a good gap and then built up a rhythm, I was just doing my job and it was enough to win, so I’m really happy. Last year there was a big fight between me, Tom, and Chaz, but the bike’s improved a lot since last year, so I’m really happy with that.”
Having spent the winter working on finding consistency, Alex Lowes arrived in Australia hoping for two Top 5 finishes.
At the end of Sunday evening, it was a case of mission accomplished for the Englishman, but having been in the middle of the podium scrap, he could be forgiven for having been slightly disappointed to come away with a brace of fourth place finishes.
Jonathan Rea may have claimed a victory-double at the season-opener, but the case could have been made for Lowes being one of the stars of the weekend.
The Yamaha YZF-R1 looked a potent weapon in the hands of the 26-year-old, and speaking to the people closest to him in the Crescent Racing run squad, it’s clear that they feel this could be only the beginning of a strong campaign.
Can we just have every race at Phillip Island? That’s certainly what a lot of fans will be thinking after a thrilling opening weekend of World Superbike action.
The tension that has simmered between Jonathan Rea and Chaz Davies over the winter came to the fore over the weekend, and once again it is these two riders fighting it out for wins.