Chaz Davies continued his barnstorming finish to the World Superbikes season continues as he blasted to his fifth win in a row in Qatar.

The Knighton-born flier has now won six of the last seven races and will look to add another in Sunday’s final race of the campaign in Losail.

Davies has taken his season’s tally to 10 wins – one more than Jonathan Rea who was crowned champ for the second year in a row after finishing second in Doha on Saturday.

The 29-year-old Ducati rider said: “After a strong practice and qualifying, I was confident about our chances to have a good result here. Today everything worked perfectly and, compared with 2015, the bike improved a lot, especially on the straight.

“To seize victory number 10 is incredible. It’s a new record by a long shot, we doubled what we achieved last year, and I’m very happy and thankful to the whole team.

“In the race I tried to keep my head down, manage the gap and the tyres, and when the grip decreased I just tried to drop the hammer to break away from Rea.”

The win with 2013 champ Tom Sykes finishing fourth cut his deficit to his Kawasaki rival to seven points in their personal battle to finish runner-up.

And Davies, who was second in the standings last year, added: “It won’t be easy to recover seven more points from Sykes, but I think Jonathan and I have shown the superior pace so far.

“We’ll go at it again on Sunday and we’ll see where that takes us. I think I have to win again, but it’s going to be tight anyway.”