Rea to third place, and opened
up a gap of three seconds to
Razgatlioglu's winning time.
Razgatlioglu and Rea swapped
the lap record in the early circuits
but it was Razgatlioglu's 1:40.328
that stood as the new lap record.
It would go again on Sunday, in
the Superpole race, and not to
Razgatlioglu.
In fourth, Axel Bassani (Mo-
tocorsa Ducati) managed to just
keep Alex Lowes behind in Race
One, after a clean but tough last-
lap fight.
Andrea Locatelli took his fac-
tory Yamaha to a clear but lonely
sixth place, over eight seconds
back from Razgatlioglu.
Toprak pushed to the early
lead in the 10-lap Superpole race
on Sunday with Rea second and
Bautista third. Soon Bautista
would pass Rea, and try to hunt
down the leader but he would
never quite get there. Instead,
he made a mistake in one corner
that allowed Rea to dream he
could get back into contention
for the win, but it was a false
hope—despite Rea setting a new
lap record of 1:40.134 on lap four.
Razgatlioglu held his nerve and
won convincingly, even if Bautista
was pressing him from close be-
hind on a clearly faster bike.
Bautista did enough in second
to only lose three points to his
main championship rival, with
Rea unwillingly ceding more
ground to the faster red bike—and
he was getting frustrated about it.
Lowes was a close fourth, feeling
he could maybe have even had a
better pace than Rea at the end.
In the afternoon, with warm
weather still bathing everyone in
sunshine, Toprak took the early
Race Two lead but Rea put in
a strong show of braking prow-
ess to pass him into the infield
hairpin, leading for five laps but
ultimately succumbing to both
Razgatlioglu and Bautista.
Bautista passed Razgatlio-
glu and led for a while, then
Razgatlioglu got him back, but
finally Bautista's ability to get the
very best out of his bike saw him
in charge of the final quarter of
the 20-lap race and run out a
clear winner, by 2.256 seconds.
Rea knew he and his bike
were beat, so he finished third,
comfortably ahead of the fourth-
placed rider Michael Ruben
Rinaldi (Aruba.it Ducati).
Lowes, in fifth place, was
as frustrated as Rea with the
straight-line pace of the Ducatis,
having the same trouble with
Rinaldi on Sunday as he had with
Bassani on Saturday.
Locatelli was sixth, and the top
BMW was that of Scott Redding
(BMW Motorrad), in seventh
place.
Garrett Gerloff's painful-looking
crash in the Superpole race did
not prevent him from riding in
Race Two, and finishing ninth, be-
hind top Honda rider Xavi Vierge.
"We had really good pace
and at least we scored a decent
amount of points, which is not
too bad, considering," Gerloff
said. "I'm a bit disappointed
because I believe we could do
more, but we'll take away the
positives."
Rea is one now looking like
he is running out of rounds to try
to win the title. He hasn't won a
race since Estoril, which bothers
him more than his championship
position, it seems, which he says
he is not thinking about yet.
Jake Gagne scored a point for
VOLUME 59 ISSUE 41 OCTOBER 11, 2022 P43
Jake Gagne came
good for a point,
carding 15th in
race two.
