Superbike The Official Book 2016 - 2017

Authors: Gordon Richie, Fabrizio Porrozzi and Federico Porrozzi, Hardbound, 192 Pages, ISBN: 9788879116589, First Published , January 2017

Jonathan Rea reached a new historical landmark in the 201 6 FIM Superbike World Championship. It may have taken until the very last weekend, and almost the last race, but Rea ensured that he would be the first back-to-back champion since Carl Fogarty in the 1 998-99 seasons.

It was a remarkable campaign for Rea all round. He scored less race wins than one of his rivals, did not win a race in any of the final three rounds, suffered two technically-induced no scores at the worst possible moment and had the pressure of leading from first to last to try and maintain.

And the weight of a number one plate not retained since the days of the greatest champion the category had ever seen.

On a new model of Kawasaki that took away previous strong points for his particular riding style he had to keep working in the pit garage let him compete consistently.

The fact that he did and scored almost 500 points across the 26 race/13 round season demonstrated that even if the challenge was greater this time, Rea had matured, grown and simply become a more complete racer.

There was a hard core of three truly top riders on the main factory machines in 2016. One other rider beyond the 'big three' was to make the leap to the very top step of the podium but in all nine different riders on five different machines scored podiums. The other two manufacturers came so close at times it must have burned to not quite take some form of silverware away.

This historic season has been charted in detail within the covers of the official WorldSBK yearbook. Machines, riders and events are depicted and analysed. The Supersport and Superstock categories, which experienced their own thrilling seasons in 2016, also enjoy their own dedicated coverage.