Marco Melandri wins Race 2 at Moscow and takes standings lead

If World Superbike’s race 1 at the Moscow Raceway was eventful, race 2 proved to be even more dramatic as Marco Melandri won the race, his sixth this season, and Max Biaggi crashed out and taking a hapless Leon Haslam with him - leaving the BMW rider to take the lead in the standings with a very important 18 point advantage after starting race 2 with just 6.5 points separating the two Italian rivals.

Once again race 1 winner Tom Sykes got the holeshot with Eugene Laverty, Leon Haslam, Marco Melandri and Jonathan Rea following while polesitter Carlos Checa dropped back to 7th only to have Max Biaggi overtake him almost immediately.

However this time the Kawasaki rider wasn’t able to use the same escape tatics as before as the tightly knit group raced after him, as Melandri began to put Laverty and Haslam in his sights and on the fifth lap the three battled for the positions letting Sykes gain an short respite and more than a one second lead, while Biaggi moved into fifth and found himself behind Melandri who had lost the first battle between his team mate and the Aprilia rider

Going into lap eight Melandri passed both Haslam and Laverty to gain the second position, while Biaggi ran wide and fell behind to seventh behind Jonathan Rea and Carlos Checa, but the Aprilia rider committed the fateful and costly mistake on lap ten when trying to pass Rea on the brakes he touched the Honda rider, bouncing wide and letting go of the his brakes and ran directly into the back of an unsuspecting Leon Haslam and the two would go down.

Advised that Biaggi was out, Melandri began to to hunt down Sykes as the battle for third went into overdrive between Jonathan Rea, Eugene Laverty with Carlos Checa and Chaz Davies joining the fray. Melandri reached Sykes on lap fifteen and at the end of the straight passed the Kawasaki rider on the brakes and sped away leaving Sykes in the clutches of the hard charging Honda and Aprilia riders.

Going into the final lap Sykes was still hanging on to his second spot shadowed by Laverty and Rea with Checa hanging on the edge the three rider group, but disaster struck when Laverty suffered a highside going into the second to final turn and went down and Rea followed as he slammed into the fallen RSV4, Carlos Checa managed to avoid the downed machines and riders by riding off track, but in the confusion Davies went through and gained the third spot on the podium while Checa ended up fourth and thanking his lucky stars that he wasn’t involved in a crash again.

Leon Camier who picked the wrong tire in race 1 rode from 18th on the grid to take fifth ahead of Davide Giugliano. Rea was able to re-join - minus a few pieces from his Honda and he finished seventh ahead of Ayrton Badovini, Loris Baz and Lorenzo Zanetti.

With only 14 riders able to cross the finish line in a crashfest, Sylvain Guintoli took 11th, ahead of John Hopkins, David Salom and Alexander Lundh. Michel Fabrizio crashed out on the opening lap when he hit Hiroshi Aoyama’s Honda that suffered a technical issue at the start and just a few turns later would cause the Japanese rider to crash and this time involving Pedercini’s David McFadden.

WSBK Moscow Race 2 Results:
01- Marco Melandri – BMW Motorrad Motorsport – BMW S1000RR – 25 laps in 40’14.677
02- Tom Sykes – Kawasaki Racing Team – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 0.976
03- Chaz Davies – ParkinGO MTC Racing – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 4.213
04- Carlos Checa – Althea Racing – Ducati 1198 – + 5.954
05- Leon Camier – FIXI Crescent Suzuki – Suzuki GSX-R 1000 – + 13.568
06- Davide Giugliano – Althea Racing – Ducati 1198 – + 15.173
07- Jonathan Rea – Honda World Superbike Team – Honda CBR 1000RR – + 23.125
08- Ayrton Badovini – BMW Motorrad Italia GoldBet – BMW S1000RR – + 23.696
09- Loris Baz – Kawasaki Racing Team – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 23.884
10- Lorenzo Zanetti – PATA Racing Team – Ducati 1198 – + 24.096
11- Sylvain Guintoli – PATA Racing Team – Ducati 1198 – + 24.881