A windy and cloudy start to Saturday’s Tissot Superpole didn’t stop Manzi from claiming a vital front row start with third place, his first since Round 1 in Australia. While Glenn van Staalen (EAB Racing Team) was the next Yamaha, taking his R6 to seventh on the grid.
Race 1 was held under the same conditions as Superpole, with strong winds and threatening clouds sweeping over the circuit. As the lights went out, Manzi gave his all to make the most of his strong grid position, piling the pressure on his rivals in the early laps. Title rival Nicolo Bulega managed to gap Manzi, but the Yamaha rider refused to give up and closed the distance to the Ducati rider at the mid-race point. However, at the chequered flag the Ten Kate Racing rider had to settle for a good 20 points and the silver medal.
It was an impressive run for van Straalen, who managed to use his good grid spot to finish Race 1 in a great fifth place. Valentin Debise (GMT94 Yamaha) had been on course to finish in the Top 5, but a last lap clash with another rider demoted him to 10th.
It wasn’t such a lucky day for Nicholas Spinelli (VFT Racing WEBIKE Yamaha), Alvaro Diaz (Arco Yart Yamaha WorldSSP) and Anupab Sarmoon (Yamaha Thailand Racing Team), with the promising trio all failing to finish Race 1.
