Welsh rider wins sixth successive World Superbikes race as champion Rea ends the season by finishing third

With the championship already decided, one expected the final race of the WSBK season to be a bit of a tame affair. But Race 2 provided a fireworks-worthy ending at the Losail International Circuit yesterday.
Ducati rider Chaz Davies claimed a double victory yesterday and produced a similar dominating performance as in Race 1, which saw him burst into the lead in the early part of the race, all the way to the chequered flag. But that didn’t mean that the Brit rider had it easy.
He first had to battle Rea who was putting up a strong fight in the first lap but then the champion went off the track in the second lap and re-joined only in 13th place.
Davies then increased his advantage over Tom Sykes, with whom he was engaged in a battle for the second place in the championship. As it stood then, Sykes would have got the second spot beating Davies by just two points.
But there was a red flag event when Qatari rider Saeed al-Sulaiti had what looked like an engine blow-out. It was an unfortunate end to the home race for local rider. But his incident meant that there was oil spillage on the track and the organisers stopped the race to be able to clean the track.
The track was cleaned up by the marshals in just 15 minutes and then race was underway again. When the race was stopped Rea had climbed up to seventh and he now had ten laps to try and catch Davies. The Kawasaki rider took advantage of the restart and was soon behind Sykes.
He battled with his teammate for a few laps and then overtook him and set off in pursuit of Davies. But despite having a few close chances, Rea couldn’t overtake Davies and he then decided to help his teammate. Towards the end of the race, Rea considerably slowed down and allowed Sykes to take second spot at the finish line.
This meant that Kawasaki had managed a 1-2 in the championship. “I am a team man. I realised that I couldn’t overtake Chaz. And it’s important for Kawasaki to get a 1-2 in the championship. Though there were no team orders, I am a gentleman and I did that for the team,” said Rea after the race. “It was an exciting race for me. It felt I was fighting for the championship all over again. I am happy to finish the season on such a high,” he added.
Davies will be happy with the knowledge that he has a powerful machine that can help him win the title next season if he continues like this.
Earlier in the day, the World Supersport race saw a thrilling finish, which saw Kyle Smith pip current world champion Kenan Sofuoglu  by just 6 thousandths of a second. In third place was Jules Cluzel, riding for MV Augusta Reparto Corse team and that final spot on the podium also gave him the second spot in the championship.
Smith riding for CIA Landlord Insurance Honda team started fifth on the grid but then worked his way up the order and put up a fierce battle with Sofuoglu’s Kawasaki for a nail-biting finish.  Luke Stapleford was the pole position man with Sofuoglu in second but it was Alex Baldolini who took the lead after the first corner.
Smith then started his move and went straight into the lead at the end of the second lap. Cluzel was battling for second place in the championship and the race with Randy Krummenacher but the Swiss rider couldn’t keep up. Stapleford crashed in the second lap and that brought an unfortunate end to his race.
World Champion had dropped down to fifth place and was caught up in traffic but then he started to make his move and with three laps to go the Turkish rider overtook Smith for the lead on the straight. It then looked like another win for Sofuoglu but the British rider didn’t give up. In the very next lap he did the same move on Sofuoglu, outbraking him in the final corner and wrestling back the lead. And then, as expected, Sofuoglu took down with exactly the same move. It looked like the Turkish rider would then keep the lead till the chequered flag but Smith overtook him at the last corner and then got a good exit speed to win a photo-finish of a race. It was a finale to the season.