Davies sign off from factory Ducati seat with thrilling Estoril Race 2 victory
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Season finale ends with drama as Chaz Davies takes victory as Jonathan Rea crashes out after battling with Toprak Razgatlioglu; Kawasaki wins Manufacturers’ Championship by one point.
The season-ending Race 2 at the Pirelli Estoril Round was full of drama at the Circuito Estoril as Chaz Davies (ARUBA.IT Racing – Ducati) claimed victory in his final race for the ARUBA.IT Racing – Ducati outfit, taking a commanding win in the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship season finale.
Davies had started the race from fourth place and was instantly in the fight for victory, moving into second place before passing Toprak Razgatlioglu (PATA YAMAHA WorldSBK Official Team) on Lap 2 before pulling away from the Turkish star, who had won two of the three races at Estoril prior to Race 2.
The battle for second came to a premature end when Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK) made contact with Razgatlioglu’s Yamaha machine at Turn 3 as he tried to pass the Turkish rider for second place. Rea was able to re-join the race and finished down in 14th place while Razgatlioglu was able to finish in third, after Scott Redding (ARUBA.IT Racing – Ducati) managed to overhaul Razgatlioglu for second place; Redding ending the season with a Ducati 1-2 as ARUBA.IT Racing – Ducati claimed the Teams’ Championship ahead of KRT. The 1-2 finish for Davies and Redding meant Ducati secured its 950th podium placement in WorldSBK.
Immediately after the race in Parc Ferme, Davies said: “It was such a weird couple of hours. I was at on the grid and all my mechanics were in tears, they’ve all written personal messages on the tank. I was like ‘I’ve got to go concentrate right now; I’ve got to pull something out of the bag’ when I’m welling up. Here we are, 21 laps later and top of the podium. Just got to put things to the back of your mind sometimes and just send it. That I did and it paid off.”
His win helped the ARUBA.IT Aruba – Ducati outfit win the 2020 Teams’ Championship although the Italian manufacturer missed out on the Manufacturers’ Championship to Kawasaki by just one point. His two wins of the season, and seven other podiums, certainly paid their part in helping the team win the Teams’ Championship.
Reacting to the Teams’ Championship win, Davies said: “All the guys in the team are such an amazing group of people. A lot of the guys on my side of the garage I’ve been with for a long time, they stick with me through thick and thin, bad race or good race it doesn’t really matter. They always believe. That’s so important in my position to know they’ve always got my back. Their job is a lot of pressure and they’ve not made mistakes in the time I’ve been with them. There’s a lot of things that could go wrong and they’ve not made any mistakes. I can’t thank them enough after seven unforgettable years with them.”
He continued: “The cherry on top, which I didn’t realize at the time, was to win the Teams’ Championship. I’ve got to say that everybody deserves that massively. That whole group of people in the box, in the Aruba Ducati team, they all deserve that. It’s such a nice way to finish, to get them that title. Very happy with that.”
credit: worldsbk.com
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