The first race of the FIM Superbike World Championship weekend in Malaysia belonged to front running winner Tom Sykes and the latest model Ninja ZX-10R, with second placed Jonathan Rea (KRT) closing out a strong 1-2 for Kawasaki at a hot and sunny Sepang.

On a day when the top two Kawasaki riders and the Ninja ZX-10R proved to be untouchable the front-running tactics of Sykes worked to perfection as he won his second race of the year and narrowed the gap to the second place rider in the championship to 23 points.

Sykes led across the start line on every single lap, setting a new lap record of 2’03.637 to go with his new track best of 2’02.246 which he had set to win Superpole just a few hours before the first race got underway. Sykes now has 34 career Superpole wins, and 28 race wins, to his credit.

In second place in the 16-lap Sepang race Rea achieved his main goal or the day, extending his championship lead over second ranked rider Chaz Davies. In keeping Davies in third place today Jonathan now has a 39 point lead to take into race two on Sunday. Rea had finished Superpole in third position, for a front row start.

Overall, the all-new Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10R has won seven of the 11 races run so far in 2016, with Sykes and Rea aiming to add to that total in race two tomorrow. Kawasaki’s lead in the Manufacturers’ Standings has grown to 43 points. The second Sepang race will take place at 16.00, local time in Malaysia, on Sunday 15 May.

Tom Sykes stated: 

“I really enjoyed the race. The bike was giving me plenty of warning, well in advance. We were able to respond in some laps in a good way and overall I am very, very grateful for all the hard work from Marcel, Danilo and all the mechanics. They have worked overtime. We have struggled to some degree over 12 months now, and this is the first time we have come a bit closer. The fact is that we were able to be consistent for race distance, which is very nice. We need to look to try and improve in some areas for tomorrow, because the other guys are fast. We had a bit of a gap today but everybody will aim to improve and we need to be one of those who also improve.”

Jonathan Rea stated: 

“I was probably a little bit too conservative in the beginning because I was waiting for that crossover point, which never happened, so I could afford to be a bit more aggressive in the first laps. I think that looking at everyone’s front tyres in parc ferme that appears to be more of the limitation compared to the rear. I am happy because we achieved out target today, which was to further extend our championship lead. It was hard here because I had prepared my race in my head and followed the whole strategy right. Tomorrow maybe I can try to take some of the energy out of the front tyre, change the balance a little bit, to not give the front tyre so much of a hard time.”


Anthony West (Pedercini Racing Team Kawasaki) performed a great job in his first ride in WorldSBK, finishing ninth. Josh Hook (Grillini Racing Team Kawasaki) scored his best result of the year for 15th in the race, with his team-mate Dominic Schmitter (Grillini Racing Team Kawasaki) in 16th place. Saeed Al Sulaiti (Pedercini Racing Team Kawasaki) was 17th and Gianluca Vizziello (Go Eleven Team Kawasaki) 18th from 19 finishers.