ROKiT BMW Motorrad’s Toprak Razgatlioglu was unmatched during Race 1 at Misano, converting pole into his fourth victory of the 2024 WorldSBK campaign.
The Turkish rider settled into the lead early on and maintained a consistently quick pace to keep Aruba.it Ducati’s Nicolo Bulega and Alvara Bautista at arm’s length.
GYTR GRT Yamaha’s Remy Gardner snatched the holeshot at lights out from the outside of the first row ahead of Razagtlioglu and Bautista, with Bulega falling back to fourth on Lap 1 of 21.
Elsewhere, Xavi Verge’s race got off to a troublesome start with a fall in Sector 1.
A bad weekend for Jonathan Rea got worse with a heavy fall from his Pata Prometeon Yamaha at Turn 13.
Rea gingerly walked away but the Northern Irishman’s race was run.
Meanwhile, Bulega was in a tough tussle with Rea’s team-mate Andrea Locatelli and Kawasaki’s Alex Lowes, losing positions to the pair of them at the start of Lap 2 before getting Lowes back at Turn 8.
Bulega then fought his way back into fourth to join team-mate Bautista in pursuit of leaders Gardner and Razgatlioglu on Lap 3.
Gardner, in search of his first win, lost the lead to Razgatlioglu with the BMW rider moving into first at Turn 8 on Lap 4.
Razgatlioglu was ready to pull away almost immediately, stretching into a 0.7s advantage just a lap into leading the race as Gardner fell into the clutches of Bautista.
Bautista pounced with 16 laps to go to pinch second from Gardner at Turn 10 and Bulega followed suit with a brave manoeuvre on the American down the back straight.
The two Ducati riders were nose to tail with Bulega looking to find a way past his more experienced team-mate.
However, the Ducati fighting allowed Razgatlioglu to stretch his lead to almost two seconds by Lap 7 as Bautista struggled to hold onto the front of his Panigale V4R.
That was all the invitation Bulega needed to move up into second and the Italian set after race leader Razgatlioglu.
After leading early on, Gardner was struggling to maintain pace with the top free and on Lap 9 had started to hold up the likes of Locatelli, Lowes and Andra Iannone.
Locatelli clipped Gardner at Turn 2 before making a series of passing attempts as Lap 9 continued.
A block pass into Turn 1 on the start of Lap 10 got the move done for Locatelli and Gardner immediately had to contend with Lowes to hold onto fifth.
But the Australian couldn’t do anything to stop the Kawasaki rider from ascending into fifth at Turn 8.
As the race went beyond half distance, Razgatlioglu looked comfortable out in front with his lead over Bulega remaining at approximately two seconds.
Bautista found himself at this point in a ‘no man’s land’ third, a second adrift of his team-mate and nearly four seconds ahead of Locatelli.
With seven laps to go Sam Lowes’ mission to finish inside the top-10 came to an end with a crash at Turn 14 and the disgruntled Marc VDS rider rejoined having fallen to the back of the field.
Razgatlioglu controlled the pace out in front, but Bulega wasn’t done trying, outpacing the Turkish rider on Lap 15 by approximately two-tenths of a second.
BMW’s enigmatic Razgatlioglu was unfazed however and kept his head to keep his margin to Bulega in and around 1.9s.
It remained that way to the chequered flag as Razgatlioglu jubilantly crossed the start/finish line as the Race 1 victor, taking the championship lead by three points over Bautista in the process.
Bulega finished 1.782s back in second with Bautista 3.176s back from the race winner in third.
Locatelli and A. Lowes completed the top five with Gardner holding onto sixth.
Team GoEleven Ducati’s Iannone finished as the leading independent rider in seventh whilst Razgatlioglu’s team-mate Michael van der Mark recovered well from 17th on the grid to finish in eighth.
Barni Ducati’s Danilo Petrucci valiantly fought his injury woe to finish a respectable ninth with Team HRC Honda rider Iker Lecuona winning his battle with Kawasaki’s Axel Bassani to take 10th.
Garrett Gerloff benefited from multiple retirements to finish 12th on his Bonovo Action BMW M 1000 RR ahead of Ducati wildcard rider Michele Pirro.
Michael Ruben Rinaldi finished in 14th aboard the Motocorsa Ducati Panigale V4R and Gerloff’s Bonovo team-mate Scott Redding picked up the final point in 15th.
HRC’s Xavi Vierge recovered from his Lap 1 crash to finish in 16th ahead of GMT94 Yamaha’s Phillipp Oettl.
Yamaha MotoXRacing’s Bradley Ray finished 18th and after running in the points for the majority of the race, a late crash relegated Puccetti Kawasaki’s Tito Rabat to 19th.
Petronas MIE Racing Honda’s Adam Norrodin completed the finishers in 20th with S. Lowes, Dominique Aegerter, Tarran Mackenzie and Rea failing to finish.
