Sylvain Guintoli's name has sl♋ipped from the top of the World Superbike Championship standings for the first time this season after a costly technical issue saw his original healthy lead demolished by Tom Sykes.

The Frenchman came into the weekend with a sizeable 28 point advantage over Sykes - the largest it had been all season -, only to see 25 points taken out of it in race one when his first retirement of the year coincided with his riv🌞al's victory.

Though Guintoli bounced back in race two to finish in third place, with Syk🌳es going on to reel off a double victory ahead, it means the Aprilia rider is dow🐼n to second place, six points behind the Kawasaki man.

"Race one was disappointing," he said. "Unfortunately at these levels these things can happen. In Race 2 I really pushed as hard as I could. When Eugene crashed I even tried to catch Rea who was in fron🅠t of me, but I wasn't able to. I'm not really happy wit🐎h third place, but it was really the most we could get today.

"The season is still f🍃ar from over. There are tracks like this one and Donington where we're weaker, but 🍷there are others where we will definitely be key players. The important thing is never to fall too far behind the leaders."