Andrea Locatelli went at it in
the early laps. 'Loka' was soon
behind the usual big three of
Razgatlioglu, Rea and Bautista.
Razgatlioglu was to be un-
touchable, of course, and
eventually Bautista got away from
an almost tactile fight with Rea,
as Alvaro squeezed very close
between turns 14 and 15 to push
inside Rea and then ease away.
His aim to win was helped
when Razgatlioglu had a slide
that put him onto the internal es-
cape road, offering a short-lived
glimmer of hope for Bautista.
Razgatlioglu duly won the race.
Rea was third, albeit nearly
12-seconds down on the winner.
Locatelli was fourth, and Michael
Ruben Rinaldi (Aruba.it Racing
Ducati) fifth.
Razgatlioglu's win took the title
fight into Sunday, for sure.
The 10 lap Superpole race
was as chaotic as ever, with
Razgatlioglu leading but Bautista
only sixth on lap one. Rea took
the lead from Torak, as the top
six rode as one extended unit on
maneuvers. Eventually Razgatlio-
glu would climb onto his lone
performance pedestal and win
by half a second. Rea was sec-
ond after a failed attempt to get
close enough to pass Razgatlio-
glu on the final lap. Bautista was,
remarkably only fourth, after
a battle with third placed rider
Andrea Locatelli (Pata Yamaha
with Brixx).
Still no championship, not
quite yet, for Alvaro Bautista, but
Axel Bassani (Motocorsa Ducati)
won the Independent Riders' title
after the Superpole race that he
just missed out on last year.
Razgatlioglu's stated aim was
to win every race in Indonesia,
and he duly did so.
Rea led the final Mandalika
race for a very short time, but
he would eventually drop back
behind Razgatlioglu. So would
Bautista, as his desire to win the
title by winning a race was clear
and obvious, especially when he
passed Razgatlioglu. There were
more crowd-pleasingly close
exchanges between the reigning
champion and champion-elect,
even with so much to lose for
each, allowing Rea to close back
up into their combined draft.
Rea would not capitalize
enough to challenge properly but
went on to take his third podium
of the weekend, knowing that
was all his current package can
do.
As Bautista's team com-
menced their transformation from
mere racing mortals to World
Championships, they readied the
pit board with a celebratory mes-
sage and Bautista finally gave up
his chase of Razgatlioglu.
He changed into gold leathers,
helmet and all, before he made
it to Parc Ferme, for a publicly
emotional few minutes. It would
be three wins for Razgatlioglu,
three podiums for Rea (he also
took his 200th Kawasaki top-
three finish in race two) but the
only eyes were for the biggest
prize, the Rider's Championship.
New champion Bautista de-
scribed his thoughts and feeling
about his championship by say-
ing, "It is a dream come true, es-
pecially after the last two years,
with the amount of difficulties.
Today is the first time I felt a bit
nervous or stressed, but it was
in the race two in the grid before
start. I tried to manage the emo-
VOLUME 59 ISSUE 46 NOVEMBER 15, 2022 P33
Alvaro Bautista with all the gold.
It was Ducati's second world title
in as many weeks.
