Race report
World Superbike Magny-Cours
Magny-Cours WSBK: Rea beats Davies for eighth straight win
Newly-crowned four-time World Superbike champion Jonathan Rea completed the double by winning the second Magny-Cours race after an early battle with Chaz Davies, Michael van der Mark and Marco Melandri.
Lewis Duncan
Edited: Sep 30, 2018, 2:34 PM
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Rea came from the third row to second after just three laps, and engaged Ducati's Davies up until the latter stages before making his decisive move to claim his eighth win in a row.
Davies and Ducati teammate Melandri drew alongside each other on the run into the first turn at the start, with the former getting the upper hand while Yamaha's van der Mark carved around the outside to take second.
Rea moved up from ninth to fourth at the Adelaide hairpin and scythed up the inside of Melandri at Turn 8 to get into the podium places.
Davies opened up an advantage of nearly a second on lap two, while van der Mark was powerless to stop Rea from coming through at Estoril on the following tour.
However, van der Mark was able to pull Rea in along the run to Adelaide, with the Kawasaki rider losing out to the Dutchman and to the flanking Melandri.
Melandri ran on at the Nurburgring chicane, though, and Rea finally made a move stick on van der Mark at Imola for second.
This battle allowed Davies to move 1.5s clear of the field, but Rea in clean air was able to wipe this out within two laps to shadow the Ducati man at the start of the sixth tour.
Rea made his first raid on the lead at Adelaide on lap nine, but Davies retained the position after the Kawasaki rider ran wide. This was repeated three laps later, but Rea got the job done at Turn 8.
Once in front, Rea eased away to secure his 14th win of the year and to tally up his 131st career podium, surpassing the all-time record set by double champion Troy Corser.
Davies held onto second for his first podium since the Misano round, with van der Mark completing the rostrum ahead of the sister KRT machine of Tom Sykes.
Melandri faded from the podium battle late on and was demoted by Tom Sykes to fifth, while poleman Lorenzo Savadori (Milwaukee Aprilia) was sixth ahead of the Yamaha of Alex Lowes, Xavi Fores (Barni Ducati), Leon Camier (Honda) and home hero Loris Baz (Althea BMW).
Guandalini Yamaha's Jakub Smrz crashed out in the closing stages at Estoril, while wildcard Matthieu Lussiana suffered yet another mechanically-induced retirement on his Dreamteamcompany Aprilia.
Race report
Cla Rider Bike Laps Gap 1 
Jonathan Rea Kawasaki 21 34'16.364 2 
Chaz Davies Ducati 21 1.804 3 
Michael van der Mark Yamaha 21 3.552 4 
Tom Sykes Kawasaki 21 4.879 5 
Marco Melandri Ducati 21 6.505 6 
Lorenzo Savadori Aprilia 21 11.477 7 
Alex Lowes Yamaha 21 15.077 8 
Xavi Fores Ducati 21 17.339 9 
Leon Camier Honda 21 17.655 10 
Loris Baz BMW 21 22.725 11 
Eugene Laverty Aprilia 21 23.257 12 
Toprak Razgatlioglu Kawasaki 21 23.637 13 Michael Ruben Rinaldi Ducati 21 26.756 14 
Jordi Torres MV Agusta 21 28.178 15 
Leandro Mercado Kawasaki 21 29.292 16 
Jake Gagne Honda 21 38.534 17 
PJ Jacobsen Honda 21 42.776 18 
Roman Ramos Kawasaki 21 46.765 19 Jeremy Guarnoni Kawasaki 21 51.689 
Jakub Smrz Yamaha 17 4 Laps 
Matthieu Lussiana Aprilia 2 19 Laps
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