Acerbis Dutch Round, Race 2: Kawasaki dominates the weekend

The verdicts coming out of the TT Circuit in Assen, La Speed ​​Cathedral, essentially reflected the predictions from the day before, which indicated Jonathan Rea as the big favorite for victory.

The World Champion with a double, the third in a row on this track, to which is added the pole position achieved by beating Marc Marquez's record with the Honda MotoGP by a tenth, confirms himself as King of Assen: for him they are overall 11 career successes here.

Unlike yesterday's Race 1, where he started a heated duel with Chaz Davies, today Rea led the second heat practically from the start, followed closely by his teammate, Tom Sykes, who attempted everything on the last lap for everything: on exiting the last corner the reigning vice-champion crossed paths, surprising Rea and thrilling the Dutch public with a sprint finish, in which the reigning champion prevailed by just 25 thousandths.

An important double for the Kawasaki Racing Team which further consolidates its leadership in the standings and finds a champion like Sykes, in great shape today after the health problems that had affected his performances in the last three races.

“It was an incredible weekend of racing. I'm especially happy with yesterday's Superpole, because that was perhaps the best lap I've ever done on a motorbike” – he said Jonathan Rhea – “Obviously I'm also happy with the two race victories. In Race 2 in the first half I pushed very hard as long as I could, and in the second half I just tried to secure the victory. Today the biggest problem was the wind. I risked crashing on the eleventh lap and so I decided to keep something for the last few laps. I then had another scare at the exit of turn 11, near the end of the race, so I then did a race of intelligence and defended the first position".

“My race on Saturday was acceptable,” he said Tom Sykes – “but we haven't stopped working to find a better setup. Physically I wasn't completely comfortable yesterday, but today I felt I could win. I always try to win and obviously I'm disappointed that I haven't had a success yet, but looking back at where I was at the start of the week, if someone had offered me two second places in Assen, I would definitely have taken them."

The fifth round of the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship will take place in two weeks at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola.