by Mark Appleton
And so it came down to this, the final race of the 2012 season to decide on the Championship winner.
Pole sitter Tom Sykes on the Kawasaki had to win to have any chance to take the title whilst Max Biaggi, starting back in tenth, would be out to do everything he could to rectify the crash from race one.
The track was damp and drying but the organisers called it a wet race though most, if not all riders, went with slick tyres.
Carlos Checa got the a great start but Sykes managed to pull it back and enter the first corner in first with Eugene Laverty in second and Jonathan Rea in third.
The first lap saw an amazing battle between Sykes and Laverty, they swapped positions with each corner as Sylvain Guintoli, now in third, watching on waiting to pounce.
As lap two came to an end Sykes was a bike length ahead of Guintoli with Laverty two bike lengths back and Leon Haslam on the BMW rounded up the leading four, Biaggi was down in tenth which meant, if the race ended now, Sykes would win the championship.
A lap later and Biaggi finally managed to make up a position by passing Sykes’s team mate Loris Baz for ninth position, he had over five seconds to make up on Checa in eighth. As things stand Sykes would win by 3.5 points.
Marco Melandri had a massive high-side, destroying the bike and this lead to Loris Baz falling as well. Both Melandri and Baz’s bikes remained on track as Melandri was being seen to at the side of the track.
Haslam had an off-track excursion on the next lap running wide, this had all lead to Biaggi moving up in the points and as things stand Sykes would win by just half a point.
With 15 laps to go Biaggi ran wide at a corner and lost a position to Davide Giugliano, this pushed the Championship standings out to 1.5 points.
Michel Fabrizio went down with 14 laps to go and it looked a spitting image of the crash Melandri had. As Fabrizio limped off, aided by the marshals, he was gesticulating towards the track.
As we entered the half-way point of the race Sykes still lead with Guintoli, Laverty and Rea chasing. Nearly nine seconds back from them was Checa, struggling with pace, and his team-mate Giugliano with Biaggi a couple of bike lengths behind them. Right behind Biaggi, who seemed to be pushing hard, was Haslam waiting to pounce.
Rea managed to get past Laverty with 11 laps remaining and in his effort to pass back Laverty had a massive moment, at the same time Biaggi got past Giugliano to move into sixth and reduce the Championship lead to half a point.
On the ninth lap Biaggi got past Checa and also took the Championship lead back from Sykes, with the Englishman at the front of the race the Championship was now out of his hands.
The Biaggi chasing pack was then reduced to two on the seventh lap as Haslam crashed out to end his BMW career on a down note.
With just four laps remaining Biaggi had opened up an unattainable lead over Giugliano which meant he would take the Championship by just half a point. Sykes could do nothing about it, he did everything that was asked of him during the race taking a fantastic dominant win but it wasn’t to be for the Yorkshireman.
Congratulations to Max Biaggi and the Aprilia team on their win.
- Tom Sykes – Kawasaki Racing Team – 38.15.725
- Jonathan Rea – Honda World Superbike Team +1.354
- Sylvain Guintoli – PATA Racing Team +2.393
- Eugene Laverty – Aprilia Racing Team +13.122
- Max Biaggi – Aprilia Racing Team +13.955
- Davide Giugliano – Althea Racing +18.229
- Carlos Checa – Althea Racing +18.430
- Chaz Davies – ParkinGO MTC Racing +26.648
- Ayrton Badovini – BMW Motorrad Italia GoldBet +33.809
- Leon Camier – FIXI Crescent Suzuki +37.217
- Maxime Berger – Red Devils Roma +38.871
- Claudio Corti – Team Pedercini +55.714
- Lorenzo Zanetti – PATA Racing Team +57.621
- Hiroshi Aoyama – Honda World Superbike Team +1.05.487
- Norino Brignola – Grillini Progea Superbike Team +1 lap
