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At the start Haga was fastest off the line and took the lead in front of Spies and Fabrizio, but the latter was the man on the move, quickly passing the American and by the second lap he also passed his team mate to take the lead. In the early stages the leading group was made up of Fabrizio, Haga, Spies and Rea. The Honda rider lost contact after a handful of laps, and the leading trio went on without dramas until lap 12, when Haga took the lead from Fabrizio, with the Italian unable to maintain Haga's pace in the third sector of the track. Michel quickly fell into the clutches of Spies and this gave an advantage to Haga, who pulled away from the battling youngsters behind him. Spies was able to snatch second by lap 17, but his pace wasn't fast enough to leave Fabrizio, who kept on pressuring him. The Italian finally got the better of Spies, who made a small mistake on lap 21, giving second place to Fabrizio. Spies gave up his chase and in the final laps Haga, Fabrizio and Spies cruised to the end.

Haga started well also in the second race and took the lead from Biaggi and Spies. The American was past Max by the next corner and set after Haga. During the first lap also Jonathan Rea was able to pass Biaggi and the leading trio carved out a small gap over the rest of the pack. On lap 2 Spies took the lead from Haga and the pair upped their pace, leaving Rea behind. The Honda rider was soon caught by Fabrizio, recovering from a bad start, but on the following lap the focus shifted to Spies, who broke his gear lever and was out of the race. On lap 4 Fabrizio passed Rea for second and sat behind Haga. The two Ducati works riders quickly pulled away from the rest, and arrived in formation at the last lap, when Fabrizio made two over-enthusiastic attempts to pass Haga, ending up by outbraking himself. The Ducati pair left Kyalami in the lead of the Championship, with Haga on 250 points and Fabrizio 165, while Spies was now in third with 162.

2002 - At Kyalami there was not much change in the finishing order from what the Championship had shown so far, as it was a two-man duel between Bayliss and Edwards. In race 1 Bayliss won in front of Edwards and Xaus, in race 2 in front of...Xaus and Edwards. All three were on Michelin rubber in a year where the tyre war was crucial for performance: the Dunlop riders were not so far behind, but not in a condition to fight for the win. Haga was a clear example: the Japanese rider started well twice and was even able to take the lead, but Bayliss only had to wait for the Dunlops to wear out and then he passed him and there were no further problems for the rest of the races.

2001 - Ben Bostrom took pole at Kyalami, but in race 1 Edwards was in a class of his own; Bayliss stayed with him for half of the race, then gave up the fight, leaving the American to cruise to the end. Third was Corser and fourth Bostrom, who in race 2 immediately took the lead at the start, while Edwards had to pass Bayliss and Corser before starting to chase him. Colin had another pace in Kyalami, caught Ben and managed to pass him, but suffered a mechanical failure soon afterwards and Bostrom won unchallenged, since Bayliss was not able to catch him and Corser was too far behind. Edwards' failure put the spotlight on Honda's poor reliability in the first two races: the American had lost a win and his team-mate Okada suffered three failures in four races (he was still at zero points after a clash with Laconi in Valencia that completed the series of retirements).