Having come out clearly defeated from yesterday’s Race-1 and from this morning’s Superpole Race, with two crashes that had by now made us think of a surrender after six years of domination, Jonathan Rea instead raised his head in Portimao. In fact, the Cannibal clearly imposed himself in Portugal, winning Race-2 as a ‘master’ and above all optimizing at best – in terms of points – the crash of Toprak Razgatlıoğlu, probably due to a technical problem on his Yamaha just where he was yesterday. Rea slipped. The respect between the two drivers over the course of this exciting year has never failed, but now that the world championship has become really hot there is no shortage of pricks, on both sides.
Yesterday the Turk had exulted after Race-1 by ‘cleaning’ a stretch of track with a broom with a green area outside it, as a ‘replica’ of the controversy for the downgrade suffered at Magny Cours for having transgressed the track limits by a few millimeters. Today it was the reigning six-time world champion’s turn to respond with the same coin. In the same stretch used by Razgatlıoğlu for his ‘cleaning operations’ in fact, Rea ostentatiously skidded with a spectacular burn-out at the end of the race. A celebration that testifies to how heated this splendid world championship race is and which reaffirms – if needed – how Rea still believes in his chances for the title. Now the Brit is 27 points behind his rival in the standings.
To whom it may concern …#PRTWorldSBK 🇵🇹 pic.twitter.com/8D2gsitmRL
– WorldSBK (@WorldSBK) October 3, 2021