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Dominique Aegerter struggled after the first race at round five of this year’s Supersport World Championship in the Czech Republic with a questionable decision by race control.

After two pole positions in a row, the WorldSSP leader had to admit defeat this time by the young Spaniard rider Manuel Gonzales. Dominique Aegerter was the fastest on track on Friday and therefore he went into this all-important session on Saturday morning in fine weather as the clear favourite for the top spot on the starting grid.

From second in the front row, the 30-year-old Swiss rider nevertheless had high hopes for the first race of the weekend at the new WorldSSP circuit. Aegerter also got off to a good start but had to let a few riders pass in the scrum of the square chicane after the start though, it did not take long to make up position by position in a row. The longer the race went on, the stronger the Ten Kate Team Yamaha rider became until his forward momentum was halted due to a red flag.

#77 Dominique AEGERTER (Ten Kate Racing Yamaha, Yamaha YZF R6), P4:

"The abandonment did not necessarily play into our cards. That was a bit unfortunate from our point of view. I got away well at the start. But in the first turn I lost a few positions. I dropped back to sixth place and was initially at a disadvantage to the guys in front of me in terms of grip. It took a few laps before I could increase my pace and keep up with the others. I also quickly noticed that others were a little bit too aggressive in the first laps. I was then able to overtake these guys quickly and started chasing the top three. At about the same time I also noticed a crash of another rider. But the race organizers waited until the two-thirds distance was reached before stopping."

"In my opinion, this action was not quite in order, because actually the red flag should be shown immediately if the safety of everyone is no longer guaranteed. Obviously, they wanted to spare themselves a restart. But it is what it is, and we have to settle with fourth place today. Until tomorrow's race, we now have to look at the data to see where and how we can improve in the early laps. That was where we squandered a better result today. Still, we are in a good position, and I think we can definitely fight for a podium again in the second race."

#CZEWorldSBK - WorldSSP Superpole:
1 Manuel GONZALES / SPA / Yamaha ParkinGo Team / Yamaha YZF R6 / 1´35.213
2 #77 Dominique AEGERTER / SWI / Ten Kate Racing Yamaha / Yamaha YZF R6 / 1´35.253 +0.040
3 Philipp ÖTTL / GER / Kawasaki Puccetti Racing / Kawasaki ZX-6R / 1´35.409 +0.196

#CZEWorldSBK - WorldSSP Race 1 Classification after 12 Laps:
1 Steven ODENDAAL / RSA / Evan Bros. WorldSSP Yamaha Team / Yamaha YZF R6 / 20´19.624
2 Manuel GONZALES / SPA / Yamaha ParkinGo Team / Yamaha YZF R6 / +0.369
3 Philipp ÖTTL / GER / Kawasaki Puccetti Racing / Kawasaki ZX-6R / +0.661
4 #77 Dominique AEGERTER / SWI / Ten Kate Racing Yamaha / Yamaha YZF R6 / +2.074

#WorldSSP Standing:
1 #77 Dominique AEGERTER / SWI / Yamaha / 182
2 Steven ODENDAAL / RSA / Yamaha / 150
3 Philipp ÖTTL / GER / Kawasaki / 124

#CZEWorldSBK - WorldSSP Time Schedule for Sunday August 8th, (CET):
09:25 - 09:40 Warm-Up
12:30 Race 2 (19 Laps - 80.028 km)