Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes won an incident-hit World Superbike race two at Laguna Seca as his team-mate Jonathan Rea retired from the race while running in the lead.
Sykes won the restarted race from Aruba.it Ducati’s Davide Giugliano after Team Toth’s Pawel Szkopek crashed out at Turn 6, resulting in a red flag and grid positions for the restart returned to the end of lap four.
Giugliano was on pole position for the restart, as he was leading Sykes and Rea at the time but it was the eventual race winner who got the holeshot when proceedings resumed.
Sykes blasted his way into Turn 1 on the ZX-10R as Giugliano fought back, initially taking over again as Honda’s Nicky Hayden barged his way past Rea and into third.
On lap four the pressure was mounting on race leader Giugliano from both Kawasakis and Rea made an audacious move on both the Italian and Sykes to take the lead at the Corkscrew only for the latter to pass under him again on the exit.
One lap later Rea swooped into the lead again at Turn 3, but moments after that disaster struck for the world champion as he ran wide at Turn 6 where he was forced to stand the bike up on the gravel to save from crashing.
Despite keeping the bike upright, the Kawasaki rider had dropped to tenth and when he resumed racing it became apparent there was a problem with his ZX-10R as he was forced to get off his motorcycle and reluctantly retire on lap six.
Rea’s misfortune allowed Sykes and Giugliano to press on with the race, as the duo enjoyed a healthy lead over the latter’s Ducati team-mate Chaz Davies in third.
Sykes continued to dictate matters at the head of the race, although in close competition from Giugliano and with four laps to go both Ducatis were right in the mix with the Yorkshireman.
That saw a frantic finale in California, as Davies and Giugliano enjoyed a thrilling contest with the Welshman first to make his move into Turns 1 and 2 on lap 18 before Giugliano repaid the favour and reclaimed second at the Corkscrew moments later.
After some more firm moves in the first few corners between the red-clad team-mates on the final couple of laps, Sykes was able to edge away slightly as he took 25 points and cut Rea’s title lead to just 46 points with eight races remaining.
Barni Racing’s Xavi Fores emerged the victor from a ferocious six-bike battle for fourth place as he held off Hayden, Althea BMW’s Jordi Torres and Honda’s Michael Van Der Mark in the end.
Pata Yamaha’s Niccolo Canepa was also in the mix but he took a solid eighth placed finish after narrowly avoiding falling at the final turn on the last lap following a crash for his team-mate Alex Lowes, chasing him at the time.
Lowes eventually remounted to finish 14th but it was a disappointing end to the race for the Brit.
His compatriot Leon Camier suffered another retirement in the laps before the restart on the MV Agusta and Milwaukee BMW’s Josh Brookes also failed to make it to the restarted race.
