Does Bautista have the championship in hand? A look at the records and “almost” impossibile comebacks

This is Bautista’s championship to lose. People started to say this last year after Magny-Cours, the Spaniard having left the French track with a 30-point lead before heading into a triple-header of favourable tracks, or rather Barcelona, Portimao and Villicum. And it has now become something of a mantra during this 2023 season. Eighteen races into the season and Alvaro has won sixteen, his remaining results a second place in the Superpole Race at Donington and a crash at Mandalika. The Spaniard leads the way in the standings with a 93-point lead over Toprak Razgatlioglu, an impressive advantage, yes, but not a record in SBK, in fact this kind of deficit has been made up in the past, a fact that might leave his rivals with at least a little hope.

Bautista impressive but the record season was 2003

Alvaro Bautista’s performance so far might look like the best ever start to a SBK season but this is in fact not the case. If we go back exactly 20 years, to 2003, the fans were still reliving that last lap duel between Colin Edwards and Troy Bayliss at Imola. But both riders switched paddocks come the end of 2002, moving to MotoGP with varying degrees of success. And in SBK Ducati debuted the brand-new 999R F03, very different to the “perfect series” designed by Sergio Robbiano under the guidance of Massimo Tamburini. The 999 designed by South African Pierre Terblanche never won a place in the heart of the ducatisti but still now, twenty years later and despite new regulations, it continues to hold a record that will be hard to repeat.

The Bolognese manufacturer chose Neil Hodgson to ride on the Ducati Fila team alongside Ruben Xaus. The English rider seized the opportunity and after finishing third in the 2002 championship, 226 points behind Colin Edwards, he began a new ‘factory’ life and began to win big.  Aboard the 999R F03, Neil Hodgson appeared unbeatable, the Brit winning eleven of the first twelve races and was only stopped by James Toseland in race 2 at Oschersleben. Neil left Silverstone after the sixth race weekend with 295 points out of a possible 300. He was followed in the standings by ‘the pianist’, although he had been less consistent, reaching the podium on just five occasions and slipping back to find himself 130 points behind the frontrunner after just six weekends. 137 points behind Hodgson was his team-mate Ruben Xaus, with six podiums but also two DNFs to his name. Neil would go on to win two more races and score six more second-place finishes, building a 140-point lead after Brands Hatch. The Englishman won the title at Assen thanks to a second place in race 1 behind Toseland, rounding out the season with a 103-point lead over the man who would replace him on the factory Ducati the following year.

The American who beat the Japanese

Back in that magical 2003 season, Ducati had nine bikes finish inside the top ten, with only Gregorio Lavilla, now the WorldSBK Executive Director, able to break the trend by placing fifth aboard the Suzuki. But there were other seasons in which the championships looked to be decided after just six rounds. In 2005 Troy Corser and Suzuki lay 73 points ahead of Chris Vermeulen, and the following year Troy Bayliss left Misano 94 points in front of Noriyuki Haga. In 2015 Jonathan Rea and Leon Haslam were separated by 101 points in what was the Northern Irishman’s first year on the factory Kawasaki. He did it again in 2018, when he built a 64-point lead over Chaz Davies. Going further back in time to 2011, Carlos Checa lay 72 points ahead of Max Biaggi in the year he scored Ducati’s last SBK title prior to Bautista’s win last year.

But in 2009, “Nitro Nori” Haga, who had moved from Yamaha to the factory Ducati 1098 in place of Troy Bayliss, held an 85 point lead over team-mate Michael Fabrizio although neither of the pair went on to become champion. The 2009 season was memorable for several reasons. The Ducati rider, thanks also to the many mistakes made by rookie Ben Spies in the early rounds, won six of the first twelve races and finished second in another five. The American won the five races in which Haga places second but crashed four times, slipping back to third in the standings after twelve races, 88 points behind Nitro Nori. But then, during the second half of the season, Spies won nine races and the Japanese rider only two. By Portimao the latter was lying just ten points ahead of the American. With a “harakiri” that was not uncommon throughout his career, Haga crashed in race 1, gifting Ben Spies the win. The American then managed this advantage in race 2 to secure the title, a first for him and Yamaha. Given the shape of Alvaro Bautista and the Panigale V4 R right now, it’s hard to imagine Toprak Razgatlioglu making a similar comeback, but if there’s one rider who could do it today, it would be the Turk.