Max Biaggi wins Race 1 and Melandri crashes out at Nurburgring

Today’s Race 1 at Nurburgring took a dramatic turn in the World Superbike championship standings when Max Biaggi took a massive and important victory - his fifth of the season - while rival Marco Melandri missed his braking mark after hitting a bump on the track during lap 7 and crashed out which changed the lead in the standings again.

Not only did Biaggi take the victory, the other two spots on the podium were occupied by Eugene Laverty and Chaz Davies who made it an Aprilia 1-2-3 for the first time in Aprilia’s Superbike history.

Biaggi was the pole sitter but at the first turn ran wide letting Tom Sykes grab the lead as Michel Fabrizio had a massive highside on the opening lap - and Biaggi, Carlos Checa, Eugene Laverty, Marco Melandri, Davide Giugliano and Jonatha Rea began chasing the Kawasaki rider.

On lap two the race lost Carlos Checa when he put the wheels of his Ducati outside the racing line and lost the front and crashed - he was able to rejoin and finish in 12th after being pipped by Maxime Berger at the final turn. Jonathan Rea also binned his machine just a few seconds later.

Davide Giugliano also lost the front of his Ducati on lap four which just added more misery to the Althea Racing team and will probably change the minimum weights allowance rule for the twin cylinders, that will be recalculated at the end of this round.

The race continued and on the 8th lap Biaggi tried to his first attack on Sykes, but ran wide and he continued to shadow and study the Kawasaki rider and it took another four laps before he made the decisive pass at the end of the straight and from there Sykes began immediately losing contact with the left side of his A tire accusing excessive wear, while Eugene Laverty and Chaz Davies began closing in on him.

Laverty passed Sykes on the 14th lap and just few corners later Davies did the same and began distancing the struggling Sykes who would finish in fourth.

Further down the field the battle for fifth was on between Sylvain Guintoli, Leon Camier and Leon Haslam and Loris Baz with the Kawasaki taking the spot but he crashed out with three laps to and promoted Leon Camier to the spot, while Guintoli finished in sixth after starting on the grid in 18th and ahead of Leon Haslam.

Lorenzo Zanetti took his best result of the season with his eighth place finish followed by Ayrton Badovini and Hiroshi Aoyama who closed out the top ten.

WSBK Nurburgring Race 1 results:

01- Max Biaggi – Aprilia Racing Team – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – 20 laps in 38’52.751
02- Eugene Laverty – Aprilia Racing Team – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 3.027
03- Chaz Davies – ParkinGO MTC Racing – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 3.127
04- Tom Sykes – Kawasaki Racing Team – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 12.306
05- Leon Camier – FIXI Crescent Suzuki – Suzuki GSX-R 1000 – + 14.131
06- Sylvain Guintoli – PATA Racing Team – Ducati 1198 – + 19.523
07- Leon Haslam – BMW Motorrad Motorsport – BMW S1000RR – + 27.017
08- Lorenzo Zanetti – PATA Racing Team – Ducati 1198 – + 33.116
09- Ayrton Badovini – BMW Motorrad Italia GoldBet – BMW S1000RR – + 34.937
10- Hiroshi Aoyama – Honda World Superbike Team – Honda CBR 1000RR – + 39.132

with twowheelsblog