Jonathan Rea won his second career World Superbike race at the Nurburgring, but Ben Spies stole the headlines after assuming the championship lead following a retirement for Noriyuki Haga.
Rea was dicing with Haga for the lead of the race when the pair collided at the opening turn on lap five, the Japanese rider having run wide before coming back onto line just as Rea was attempting to slip back up the inside.
Making contact, while Rea was able to continue, Haga could not remain upright and was forced to lay his Ducati Xerox down. Although it was a low speed accident, Haga was unable to get going again. Yahoo! Eurosport
Rea said: “After race one, when I had issues with my number one bike and was really disappointed with fourth place, I was really motivated for race two and the guys in the garage gave me the instruction manual on how to win.
“Back on my number one machine I got a really bad start and had to be aggressive on the first couple of laps especially at turn one. Haga ran quite wide and I went on the inside line and although I didn’t see him I felt the bang and only found out after the race he had crashed.”
“I gave it my all in the race and the package we had was very strong today. I knew I had to make no mistakes on the last lap, as Ben was so close.”
“Breaking the lap record on that last lap was a bonus and testament to how strong the bike was, and hopefully we can carry this momentum on to the next round in Italy.” Belfast Telegraph
Spies’ second and Haga’s crash moved the Yamaha rider into the championship lead, with 364 points to Haga’s 346 and Haga’s team mate Michel Fabrizio a distant third on 289. Motoring
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