Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes saw his challenge for a second World Superbike title come to an end at Sepang when tyre problems and a crash saw him only able to score 13 points and Aruba Ducati’s Chaz Davies leapfrog him for second in the points table.

Sykes led race one for 11 of the 16 laps and posted new lap record of 2’03.654 on lap two before he was forced to slow near the end as his tyre gave up the ghost after it did all of its useful work early on.

In race two Sykes was involved in a first corner incident when Max Biaggi was pushed wide exiting the corner and he and Sykes collided. Sykes continued, dropped some places he would late make up again, before falling as he tried to recover even more positions. He restarted at the back and fought back to score 14th and two points.

“We were unlucky in race two as someone got on the inside of Max and he was pushed wide. He had nowhere to go and he picked it up. I was on the outside, so bad luck really. I was catching the group in front and felt good after making a change to the bike after race one,” said Sykes.

“It was better but not perfect. I struggled with a bent brake lever after the contact and then when I fell later on I bent the gearlever up about 15mm and broke the footpeg off, so I only had a little stub. We were unlucky today, which is a shame because we had great pace on the bike. The tyre dropped a lot in race one and we never expected that.”