Czech WorldSBK: "Big
Three" All Winners
T
he racing in WorldSBK was
again simply epic in Most,
Czech Republic, July 29-31,
with the outside world seemingly
watching along, as is the new
normal. A decent but not stun-
ning crowd of 37,081, mostly
on a sunny Sunday, made sure
nobody was lonely on site.
Superpole qualifying belonged
to the seemingly endlessly ambi-
tious Jonathan Rea (KRT) who
pushed himself along at a new
track-best pace of 1:30.947.
The next closest rider, Toprak
Razgatlioglu (Pata Yamaha with
Brixx), was 0.330 seconds
behind.
The first race did see rain, gos-
samer drops of it in the middle of
the 22-lap contest. Thankfully not
the thunderous deluge promised
by the weather forecasts from the
day before. FP3 in the morn-
ing was wet, and some did not
venture out at all (Rea, Redding
included) but they more than
made up for it in the races.
Some showed caution and
others showed more pace when
the rains did finally touch the
ground, and it brought what
was going to be a runaway "Big
Three" back into the grasp of
some others.
Andrea Locatelli (Pata Yamaha)
endeared himself to none of his
peers as he ran across the front
of them all entering the tight right
of the first chicane on the warm-
up lap, saying he was judging
where the limit was before the
race started. Others said he was
IN
THE
WIND
P36
The "Big Three"—Jonathan Rea
(65), Alvaro Bautista (19) and Toprak
Razgatlioglu (1)—went at it at Most.
They all had wins, but Bautista was the
big winner, as he extended his points
lead over Rea.
PHOTOS: GOLD & GOOSE
