It came down to the final few laps for Tom Sykes (Kawasaki Racing Team) to make sure of his seventh win in a row at Donington, after it looked at some stages like he would have to work hard for a podium.
Sykes had been down in fourth place in the early laps after being roughed up by eventual second place rider Davide Giugliano (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati), as Chaz Davies (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) led out front. Davies would crash, on two occasions, the second one being a terminal front-end loss into the fast right at Coppice.
Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team) ended up third in 23-lap race after running on at Goddards twice, and losing his place while keeping up a good pace.
A real scrap behind the leading three in the final laps saw Leon Camier (MV Agusta Reparto Corse) fourth, by 0.2 of a second from a charging Nicky Hayden (Honda World Superbike Team). Long time potential top four rider Lorenzo Savadori (IodaRacing Team Aprilia) ran wide and lost places, even after an audacious attempted pass on Hayden late in the race. He finished sixth but at one stage was heading for his maiden podium.
With Jordi Torres (Althea BMW Racing Team) seventh there were six different makes of bike inside the top seven places.
Michael van der Mark (Honda World Superbike Team) secured eighth and a jump in real race form for Karel Abraham (Milwaukee BMW) put him ninth.
After an incident-packed last few laps Anthony West (Pedercini Racing Kawasaki) took tenth after a collision with Alex De Angelis (IodaRacing Team Aprilia) who crashed out at Redgate after both riders had been passed in one move by Davies.
Lone Yamaha rider Cameron Beaubier crashed out early in a race, which his one-off team-mate Alex Lowes (Pata Yamaha Official WorldSBK Team) was forced to miss through injury.Josh Brookes (Milwaukee BMW) was 14th in race one.