2016 Magny-Cours World Superbike Race One: Game On For The Win

Davide Giugliano will not be taking part in the races this weekend, being declared unfit. He would miss out on a 21-lap wet race today where Tom Sykes would need to cut into Jonathan Rea's forty-seven point lead if he is to challenge for the title.

Tyre choice would be varied with the conditions with most riders choosing wet weather tyres, with Chaz Davies and a couple of other Ducatis on intermediate tyres and Josh Brookes taking the long odds of the slick tyres.

As the lights went out, Jonathan Rea led Tom Sykes but Sykes would take the lead from his teammate within a few turns with Michael van der Mark, Nicky Hayden and Sylvain Guintoli behind them. Leon Camier and Lorenzo Savadori were in sixth and seventh place, ahead of Chaz Davies.

A lap in, Nicky Hayden and Jonathan Rea swapped places a few times, fighting for second place and Leon Camier set the fastest lap, a 1'54.901, on his way to fifth place. Chaz Davies put in a 2'00.816 in twelfth placeand Josh Brookes did a 2'12.863 in last place. Wet tyres looked like the right tyres to be on.

On the third lap, Leon Camier closed the gap to forth place and started annoying Michael van der Mark as he looked for a way past, and as van der Mark pushes past Nicky Hayden for third place, Camier followed him through and took fourth. Camier wasted no time in pressing his advantage and took third place from the Hondas and started closing down the Kawasakis in front. On the fourth lap, Camier stuck with the Kawasakis in front while Lorenzo Savadori caught up with the duelling Hayden and van der Mark, passing the Dutchman as the American took fourth place. Tom Sykes in first set the fastest lap, a 1'54.264 on lap four, with Chaz Davies in with a 1'57.030, still back in twelfth place. Josh Brookes in twenty-third place on the slicks had a 2'05.752 but that was the last of his two-minute laps. Conditions were changing, but wet tyres were still quickest.

Matthieu Lussiana pitted in and changed his wet tyres to slick tyres, as it was obvious he wasn't happy with his choice from the beginning, as he considered pitting in after the warmup lap, bottling out of changing at the last minute and taking his place on the grid instead of in pit lane.

Lap five, Camier caught the Kawasakis and had a gap of over a second to Nicky Hayden in fourth place, but at the end of the lap, Hayden also pitted in for new tyres but Leon Camier set the fastest lap on wet tyres with a 1'54.206. Chaz Davies on the intermediate rubber, very similar to slicks, set a 1'55.845, the gap closing between the tyres. Brookes on the slicks, the only benchmark for dry rubber, set a 1'59.274.

It would soon be the ideal time to change from the wet tyres to slicks.

Lap six and Nicky Hayden came out of the pits on slick tyres. Sykes, Rea and Camier led Savadori by almost two seconds. Lap seven, local rider Matthieu Lagrive set the fastest lap on wet weather tyres, a 1'52.872. Davies was closing in with a 1'53.892 while Hayden, the fastest man on slick tyres, registered a 1'56.316.

At the front, Leon Camier on the MV Agusta passed Jonathan Rea, then took the lead from Tom Sykes on lap nine. Further back, Michael van der Mark conceded fifth place, pitting in for slick tyres. On lap nine, Chaz Davies in ninth place recorded a 1'51.641 compared to Camier's 1'53.270 in the lead.

Wet weather tyres were no longer the tyres to be on.

Nicky Hayden, having changed a couple of laps before, pitted in at the end of lap nine with a mechanical problem, ending his race. Leon Camier in the lead would start to eke out a lead of over a second from the Kawasakis of Sykes and Rea who were joined by the Aprilia of Lorenzo Savadori. Savadori finally passed Rea and Sykes and the Kawasakis played the waiting game, with Sykes choosing not to pit in at the optimum time because he was concerned about slick tyres and the three left handers that could be tricky in the wet while Rea would not pit in until Sykes did, more concerned about the championship than the win.

Most of the field changed tyres at the end of the tenth lap, approaching the halfway mark and on lap eleven, carving his way to tenth place, Michael van der Mark set the fastest lap, a 1'47.808, a clear four seconds quicker than Leon Camier's 1'51.846 in the lead.

At the end of lap twelve, with Leon Camier over two seconds clear of Lorenzo Savadori, the Kawasakis concede third and fourth places to Alex De Angelis and Chaz Davies, both ten seconds back. Davies with a 1'48.648 to Camier's 1'50.960. Over two seconds a lap quicker, with less than ten seconds to close in nine laps, it looked like Davies took the right gamble with intermediate tyres, but van der Mark was closing in with a 1'46.368, over two seconds faster than Davies.

Van der Mark made the tyre change at the exact right time, but Davies may have made the better choice with risking intermediates and hoping he'd not get taken out in the first few laps, a risky proposition in these conditions.

As Camier's tyres started to go off the boil, with six laps left, Savadori closed in, but Davies was only six seconds behind and two seconds a lap faster. Savadori took the lead but Davies blasted past the pair of them on lap sixteen and never looked back.

Michael van der Mark continued to ride around slower riders, scything underneath where needed and round the outside where not. Jonathan Rea and Tom Sykes duelled further back for eight place, despatching slower riders in their wake.

On the penultimate lap, Van der Mark caught Savadori and just rode around him as if he weren't there, taking a fast wide line round a right hander and leaving the Aprilia rider to the charging Kawasakis behind him. Sykes caught and passed Savadori with ease with Rea having made a mistake and dropping to almost four seconds from Savadori. On the last lap, Rea closed that gap, as he was over five seconds a lap quicker, and he took fourth place at the flag.

Chaz Davies, having over twelve seconds over Michael van der Mark in second place, took the victory and coasted along the side of the track as he crossed the line, slapping hands with his crew as they leant over the barrier, beating the long odds of surviving without a tyre change and winning his Nth race of the year.

Tom Sykes took the last place on the podium and took a few points off Jonathan Rea in fourth, but not as many as he had wanted for his title challenge.

Jonathan Rea leads the title chase by forty four points over Tom Sykes with five races left, with Chaz Davies a further forty two points behind.

Results: