After dominating Free Practice sessions and Superpole, Federico Caricasulo scored his first win in this season on his home track, at Misano. After starting from pole position, the Italian was overtaken by Jules Cluzel, but at the fourth of 19 laps he went back to first with a great move and there it’s when his escape to the win started. This led Caricasulo to his second win in World Supersport, almost one year and a half after triumphing at Buriram in 2017. The other two spots of the podium went to Raffaele De Rosa, who scored his fifth podium finish in a row, and Sandro Cortese, while Cluzel ranked 4th.
DECISIVE MOVE – At the beginning Jules Cluzel made a wonderful start from second place and this led him to first ahead of Caricasulo. While his compatriot Lucas Mahias crashed during the second lap while fighting with De Rosa, “Julo” tried to remain first by blocking Caricasulo’s attacks, but at the fourth lap the Italian passed Cluzel at Variante del Parco and the same was done by De Rosa one corner after.
SWEET ESCAPE – In the laps after the overtake on Cluzel, Caricasulo pushed hard to shake De Rosa off and the MV Agusta rider remained with the GRT Yamaha one till the seventh lap, when “Carica” started to escape till having a more-than-one-second advantage. De Rosa and Cortese tried to catch Caricasulo during the second half of the race, but in the final laps the leader returned pushing hard andnthis definitely gave him an important win for both him and GRT Yamaha.
PODIUM – After a series of four third-place finishes, Raffaele De Rosa managed to rank second at Misano after keeping Sandro Cortese (Yamaha Kallio Racing) behind him. Cortese, anyway, scored an important podium finish ahead of his rival Jules Cluzel. Lonely fifth place for Randy Krummenacher (Yamaha BARDAHL Evan Bros.), while Anthony West ranked sixth ahead of Kyle Smith. Wildcard entry Lorenzo Gabellini, Hikaro Okubo and Ayrton Badovini closed the top 10, while Rob Hartog won in ESS category by finishing 13th.
MANY RIDERS OUT – Something to be remarked is the fact that many riders crashed during the race, such as wildcard Stefano Valtulini (while he was fighting for 4th with Cluzel), Thomas Gradinger, Stefan Hill and Loris Cresson. Incredible sighting-lap crash involved Alex Baldolini and Eemeli Lahti, with the first later taken to Medical Centre. Twice technical issues for Sheridan Morais, who stopped during the sighting lap but managed to take part in the race, where he had to retire always due to technical failure.
Photo Credit: Marco Lanfranchi