Another World Supersport race did take place in the Netherlands, in Assen. It was Kenan Sofuoglu who took pole position. Patrick “PJ” Jacobsen and Michael Canducci qualified to the front row as well.
Lucas Mahias, Jules Cluzel and Sheridan Morais were in the second row. Luke Stapleford, Federico Caricasulo and Kyle Ryde were in the row number three.
Anthony West, Robin Mulhauser, Hiromichi Kunikawa and Kyle Smith got 3 places grid penalty.
When the race started it was Kenan Sofuoglu who went to the lead immediately. Lucas Mahias and Sheridan Morais followed him.
But a moment later Jules Cluzel overtook Morais for the third position.
With 12 laps to go Sofuoglu increased his lead to already more than 2 seconds. Lucas Mahias was 2nd, Jules Cluzel 3rd, Sheridan Morais 4th, Federico Caricasulo 5th. Patrick Jacobsen was 6th behind them.
Jules Cluzel made a move for P2. But some laps later Lucas Mahias took the second position back. Also Caricasulo wanted to play his role there and was up to 4th already.
Sofuoglu was going in the lead but behind him there was a battle for the rest two places on the rostrum. It was a group of Cluzel, Caricasulo, Mahias, Morais and Jacobsen.
Kenan Sofuoglu took his first victory of this season. It was also first race of the year which he finished as he had to skip first two race weekends due to injury and he crashed in the previous round.
Lucas Mahias was already celebrating his P2 on his back wheel on the finish line and Jules Cluzel almost overtook him! In the end it was 0.005 between them!
PJ Jacobsen was 4th, Sheridan Morais 5th, Federico Caricasulo 6th. Michael Canducci finished 7th then, Luke Stapleford 8th, Christiam Gamarino 9th, Rob Hartog 10th. Good result for the local rider and also Hartog was the best ESS rider.
Kyle Smith, Kyle Ryde, Hannes Soomer, Anthony West and Roberto Rolfo also took some points.
Niki Tuuli (one of the favourites for me) was only 16th. Gino Rea (another favourite) 17th.
You can see the full race results here on the official website.
Lucas Mahias is the Championship leader with 65 points. Sheridan Morais has 45 points and Roberto Rolfo has 41 points. Here is the current standing.
In the Team standing there is the GRT Yamaha in the lead with 100 points. Kawasaki Puccetti is second with 74 points, Kallio Racing is third with 72 points.
Yamaha leads the Manufacturers standing with 90 points. Kawasaki is second with 62 points while third MV Agusta has 59 points.
Next round will be in Italy, Imola from 12th to 14th May.
Photo: WorldSBK
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