Paul Carruthers | April 25, 2010
Racing in front of his Ten Kate Honda team’s home crowd, Jonathan Rea won his first World Superbike race of the season today in the first of two races at the Circuit van Drenthe in Assen, Holland. The win was also Honda’s first of the season as the youngster from Northern Ireland led an all British podium.Rea had his hands full throughout the race and his battle came down to the end with Sterilgarda Yamaha’s James Toseland and Aprilia’s Leon Camier. Toseland led with three laps to go, but pole sitter Rea managed to get it back and he led the sprint to the finish line, besting Toseland by 1.1 seconds. The runner-up finish was Toseland’s best of the season and he got there from 10th on the grid. It was also a career day for Camier, who was another tenth of a second behind in what was his best-ever World Superbike result in his debut season in the series.Fourth place went to Althea Ducati’s Carlos Checa, the Spaniard starting slowly but managing to work his way through the field to eventually finish right on Camier’s rear wheel.Troy Corser, who led for some 10 laps on the factory BMW after giving the German factory its first-ever front row start, finished fifth.It was a rough race for championship leader Leon Haslam, the Brit making at least two big mistakes en route to a 11th-place finish. Fortunately for him, Aprilia’s Max Biaggi wasn’t much better as his sixth-place finish only saw him gain five points on Haslam.Seventh place went to Jakub Smrz, the Czech besting Yamaha’s Cal Crutchlow and Althea Ducati’s Shane Byrne. Xerox Ducati’s Noriyuki Haga finished 10th after coming out on top of a battle with Haslam, Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes, the second factory Ducati of Michel Fabrizio and Alstare Suzuki’s Sylvain Guintoli.American Roger Lee Hayden finished 19th on the Pedercini Ducati in his Assen debut.
Race One
1. Jonathan Rea (Honda)
2. James Toseland (Yamaha)
3. Leon Camier (Aprilia)
4. Carlos Checa (Ducati)
5. Troy Corser (BMW)
6. Max Biaggi (Aprilia)
7. Jakub Smrz (Ducati)
8. Cal Crutchlow (Yamaha)
9. Shane Byrne (Ducati)
10. Noriyuki Haga (Ducati)
Paul Carruthers | Editor
Paul Carruthers took over as the editor of Cycle News in 1993 after serving as associate editor since starting his career at the publication in 1985. Carruthers has covered every facet of the sport in his near-28-year tenure at America's Daily Motorcycle News Source.
