The FIM Supersport World Championship kicked off World Championship racing action at the Pertamina Mandalika International Street Circuit with 19 thrilling laps of Race 1 action as Italian rider Raffaele De Rosa (Orelac Racing VerdNatura) claimed his first WorldSSP victory. The Italian withstood pressure from the 2021 Champion and some early-race rain to claim his first victory at the 89^th attempt of asking.

De Rosa had looked strong in the Tissot Superpole session and lined up from fourth on the grid, giving him a good starting spot for the 19-lap encounter. He was able to fight with the lead group throughout the race before he made a break at around half-distance at the head of the field, maintaining a gap of just under a second to the chasing Federico Caricasulo (VFT Racing).

As the race reached a thrilling conclusion, Dominique Aegerter (Ten Kate Racing Yamaha) was the rider on a move as he gained almost two seconds on De Rosa between Lap 16 and Lap 18, with the pair just 0.182s apart at the start of the 19^th and final tour. With the pace advantage shown by Aegerter over the previous couple of laps, it looked like the 2021 Champion would take a last-lap victory but De Rosa held on for his first victory in WorldSSP, and in doing so became the first Italian rider to win on a Kawasaki in the Championship.

Reacting to his first WorldSSP victory, De Rosa said: “After many, many races… I did it! It was a very strange and difficult race because the weather conditions changed many times. My pace was good in the wet and dry conditions. I am happy about this. I stayed concentrating on my ride in order to go as clean as possible. I concentrated on my pace. I checked the gap with Dominique but, in the end, I stayed focused on not making a mistake and trying to win.”

WorldSSP returns on track at 09:25 Local Time (GMT+8) with Warm-Up before Race 2 at 13:30 – watch it all using the WorldSBK VideoPass!