Britain's Tom Booth-Amos took second in today's opening WorldSSP300 race at Jerez, beating fellow British Motostar Champion Scott Deroue by 0.087s.

Thrilling racing and scorching temperatures greeted FIM Supersport 300 World Championship riders for the start of the season, which got underway with a chaotic race.

Unai Orradre (Yamaha MS Racing) broke away from the lead group at around half distance before going on to take victory.

Orradre took advantage of Ana Carrasco (Kawasaki Provec WorldSSP300) running wide on Lap 5 to move into the lead before pulling out around half a second to break the slipstream effect, enabling the Spanish rider to control the race without pressure from the chasing pack. Until Carrasco ran wide, there had been a lead group of nine riders.

The battle for second went down to the last corner of the last lap between Scott Deroue (MTM Kawasaki MOTOPORT), Carrasco, Tom Booth-Amos (RT Motorsports by SKM – Kawasaki) and Yuta Okaya (MTM Kawasaki MOTOPORT), Thomas Brianti (Prodina Ircos Team WorldSSP300) and Bahattin Sofuoglu (Biblion Motoxracing Yamaha WSSP300).

Carrasco was second heading into the final corner after an aggressive move on Deroue on the final lap but the 2018 Champion ran wide at the final corner; moving her down to seventh place. Booth-Amos took advantage of this to move into second place while Deroue finished third, Okaya fourth and Brianti fifth; just 0.058s separating the trio at the line. Booth-Amos had a Margin of 0.087s ahead of Deroue.

Behind Carrasco in seventh, Kevin Sabatucci (Kawasaki GP Project) finished in eighth place around four seasons behind Carrasco but in a tight battle with Alvaro Diaz (Biblion Motoxracing Yamaha WSSP300) with the pair separated by 0.002s at the line. Sabatucci and Diaz were part of a second group of riders behind the leaders which also featured Nick Kalinin (Battley-RT Motorsports by SKM-Kawasaki) and Ton Kawakami (Yamaha MS Racing); the pair finishing tenth and 11th respectively. The top 11 were separated by just 7.836s after the 10-lap race.

Samuel Di Sora (Leader Team Flembbo) was 12th after making his way through the Last Chance Race to claim a point-scoring finish, finishing two tenths clear of Kim Aloisi (ProGP Racing). Alejandro Carrion (Smrz Racing – Willi Race) finished in 14th place with Koen Meuffels (MTM Kawasaki MOTOPORT) claiming the final point. Like Di Sora, he had to fight his way through the Last Chance Race to make it onto the grid.

There was an incident involving Johan Gimbert (GP Project) and Hugo De Cancellis (Team TRASIMENO) in the race with a battle on track, with both riders retiring from the race following the crash after completing one lap. De Cancellis had been at the back of the grid following a penalty for a tyre pressure infringement and had made his way into 24th position before the incident.

Other retirements include Tom Bercot (ProGP Racing) on the opening lap, Mika Perez (Prodina Ircos Team WorldSSP300) who had came off his bike of his own accord and Tom Edwards (Kawasaki ParkinGO Team).