Argentina WSBK: Razgatlioglu beats Redding to win by 0.046s
Yamaha’s Toprak Razgatlioglu fended off a late charge from Ducati rival Scott Redding in the Superpole race to clinch his second victory of the Argentina World Superbike weekend.
Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Starting second on the grid, Razgatlioglu eased past polesitter Redding into Turn 1 to take the lead of the race, with Jonathan Rea slotting into third place on the factory Kawasaki.
Within two laps Razgatlioglu had built a 0.8s gap over the chasing pack and he went on to extend that to nearly a second before Redding started reeling into his advantage in the second half of the race.
By lap 7, Redding had managed to close within three tenths off the Turkish rider and he continued to bridge the gap over the following two tours.
The battle between the two continued into the final lap, with Redding making a lunge into the Turn 7 left-hander, the preferred spot for overtaking on the track. But the Ducati rider ran too deep into the turn, allowing Razgatlioglu to retake the lead and get a better exit into the long back straight.
Redding did manage to fight back after his Turn 7 error and began a drag race to the finish coming out of the final corner, but Razgatlioglu held on to the lead by just 0.046s to chalk up his 13th victory of the season.
Rea was unable to threaten the leading duo for victory despite an encouraging start from fifth on the grid, finishing nearly 3.5s behind in third. The Kawasaki rider has slipped 34 points off Razgatlioglu ahead of the second full-distance race of the weekend later on Sunday.
Meanwhile, Axel Bassani continued to impress on the Motocorsa Ducati, finishing as the top independent rider in fourth ahead of the factory BMW of Michael van der Mark and the second works Yamaha of Andrea Locatelli.
Garrett Gerloff was next up in seventh on the GRT Yamaha, while factory Ducati rider Michael Ruben Rinaldi slipped to eighth in the final order after running as high as fifth on lap 6.
Alex Lowes also fell down the pack in the final stages of the race, the Kawasaki rider bagging just a single point in ninth ahead of Honda duo Leon Haslam and Alvaro Bautista.
Superpole race results:
Cla | # | Rider | Bike | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 54 | Toprak Razgatlioglu | Yamaha | |
2 | 45 | Scott Redding | Ducati | 0.046 |
3 | 1 | Jonathan Rea | Kawasaki | 3.419 |
4 | 47 | Axel Bassani | Ducati | 5.407 |
5 | 60 | Michael van der Mark | BMW | 8.556 |
6 | 55 | Andrea Locatelli | Yamaha | 9.608 |
7 | 31 | Garrett Gerloff | Yamaha | 9.821 |
8 | 21 | Michael Ruben Rinaldi | Ducati | 10.415 |
9 | 22 | Alex Lowes | Kawasaki | 12.063 |
10 | 91 | Leon Haslam | Honda | 15.170 |
11 | 19 | Alvaro Bautista | Honda | 15.685 |
12 | 53 | Tito Rabat | Kawasaki | 18.017 |
13 | 7 | Chaz Davies | Ducati | 18.470 |
14 | 3 | Kohta Nozane | Yamaha | 20.327 |
15 | 50 | Eugene Laverty | BMW | 20.341 |
16 | 36 | Leandro Mercado | Honda | 21.262 |
17 | 32 | Isaac Viñales | Kawasaki | 21.534 |
18 | 76 | Samuele Cavalieri | Ducati | 26.152 |
19 | 23 | Christophe Ponsson | Yamaha | 27.693 |
20 | 4 | Luciano Ribodino | Kawasaki | 47.417 |
21 | 39 | Marco Solorza | Kawasaki | 51.079 |
View full results |
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