Troy Bayliss (Ducati Xerox) bounced back from his race 1 defeat to take a thrilling victory from Yamaha's Noriyuki Haga in the German Round of the World Superbike Championship at the EuroSpeedway. In the first 24-lap encounter Troy made all the running until half-distance, but tyre problems meant that he was passed by Haga and then by Max Biaggi (Suzuki) and Troy Corser (Yamaha) four laps from the end, finishing fourth. The second race was showing a similar pattern to the first as Haga again passed Troy on lap 14 to take the lead, but this time the team had fitted a harder front tyre to his 999, which certainly contributed to the result, and Troy was then able to re-pass his Japanese rival on lap 20 to take the chequered flag for his fortieth Superbike win.
"These wins are hard to get but when you do take one they are very enjoyable, so I'm very happy with that second race today" declared Troy. "I've been racing against Nori since year 2000 and we've had some great battles over the past, they've all been very memorable. Sometimes he takes the win or I do but I love having a dice with Nori. Honestly there wasn't much difference between the bikes in the two races, sometimes you have a problem and it goes like that. We weren't happy with the first race and you could tell the difference in the second race because the bike was better to ride. It did look like the same was going to happen as I opened out a lead of 2 and a half seconds, and I did wonder that but it didn't and I could push the whole race. I did make one mistake and that allowed Nori to come past. I was on the limit trying to gap Nori and it wasn't easy. It was nice to have my electronics engineer Alessandra on the podium with me, she does all the stuff with the computer and she did a great job as always!".
Lorenzo Lanzi scored a couple of disappointing results at a circuit where he won in 2005, with the only really positive moment being when he overtook Toseland for eighth on the final lap of the first race. "Every time I come and race here, it seems that my performance gets worse instead of better and I am unable to explain why. For me it seems that it's a bit of a lottery every time I have to chose the tyres" commented Lorenzo. "The first five laps went well, then the tyres began to create problems for me. After that I had to keep a ridiculous pace, much slower than what I was expecting to do, and the results were not at all satisfactory: eighth place in race 1 and twelfth in race 2, fighting to the end. I don't know what to say, behind I had the same tyre as Troy, up front a slightly less hard one, but I was unable to stay amongst the front-runners".
Race 1:
- Haga (Yamaha)
- Biaggi (Suzuki)
- Corser (Yamaha)
- Bayliss (Ducati Xerox)
- Rolfo (Honda)
- Laconi (Kawasaki)
- Nieto (Kawasaki)
- Lanzi (Ducati Xerox).
Race 2:
- Bayliss
- Haga
- Biaggi
- Toseland (Honda)
- Corser
- Xaus (Ducati)
- Rolfo
- Nieto
12. Lanzi.
Points (after 11 of 13 rounds):
Riders:
- Toseland 375
- Haga 334
- Biaggi 322
- Bayliss 29
- Corser 254
- Xaus 177
- Lanzi 173
- Rolfo 166; etc.
Manufacturers:
- Honda 393
- Yamaha 388
- Ducati 363
- Suzuki 341
- Kawasaki 148
- MV Agusta 1
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