Sam Lowes wins the chaotic SSP race at Motorland

The World Supersport race at the Motorland Aragón Circuit got off to a very bad start, as at the start Matthew Scholtz stalled on the grid and was hit from behind by Yves Polzer, a very heavy impact that caused a red flag and the arrival of the ambulances. We still don’t know the extent of the injuries: one of them walked away on his own two feet but limping, while the other, Scholtz in principle, had to be taken away by ambulance.

A bitter taste for restarting the race, with everyone’s eyes on the medical centre to find out about the condition of both riders, but until we have official information, we prefer to leave out further details.

With the race stopped, it was restarted over 18 laps, so everything went on as if the incident had never happened, with the same number of laps to go and several favourites, including Sam Lowes, Jules Cluzel, Kenan Sofuoglu, Sheridan Morais and Broc Parkes, although lap by lap the group kept shrinking, especially after Cluzel’s crash and Lowes’s slide.

So Lowes pulled away, and behind him a very interesting battle developed between Sofuoglu, Foret and Morais, but Morais ran wide and the fight came down to the Turk and the Frenchman. As always, Kenan showed his very, very aggressive riding style, even making several overtakes… rather ugly ones, with glares and head-butting gestures toward his rivals, or rather attempts at it, but very un-sportsmanlike. This situation led Race Direction to investigate and penalise him: he had to drop three positions, but the reverse happened, as the number 54 passed Lowes and began to push hard in the race…

So the final lap began with Sofuoglu first (penalised), Lowes 2nd, Foret 3rd, Morais 4th and Parkes 5th; but afterwards the results were confirmed as Lowes 1st, Foret 2nd, Morais 3rd, Parkes 4th, Sofuoglu 5th, Quarmby 6th, Iannuzzo 7th, Metcher 8th, Talmacsi 9th and Day 10th.

The sad part was the crash of Alex Baldolini as well: the number 25 went down and tried to return to the action, but in the end he had to head into the pits, luckily without physical consequences for him.

Photo | Plusmoto.com (David Gómez)