The numbers certainly stacked up for Huddersfield racer Tom Sykes as he claimed his first win of the 2016 World Superbikes Championship.

His victory in race two brought him his 66th podium, took his points tally for the season to 66 and all this on bike No66.

The win was the 27th of the 30-year-old’s World Superbikes career, but more importantly broke the strange hold of his Kawasaki Racing Team colleague Jonathan Rea.

Reigning world champion Rea went into the second meeting of the season having notched a double at Australia’s Phillip Island, and with a race one victory at the Chang Circuit in Thailand looked set to do the same again.

However, 2013 champion Sykes produced a superb fight to take race two from his teammate having finished second in the first race in Buriram.

The two Kawasakis, who were second (Sykes) and third (Rea) on the grid, were out in front for all of both contests, but in race one Rea took the lead from Sykes with five laps to go and never looked back.

In race two Sykes again held the lead only to slip behind eight laps from home, but Rea then made a mistake and Sykes was back in front on the next lap.

The final two laps proved to be breath-taking as the lead swapped hands no fewer than four times with the Yorkshireman holding out round the final three bends to take the chequered flag.

“After race one it was obvious that Jonathan had the pace, but we felt that we could match it,” said Sykes.

“We were more consistent and doing better than we had been here last year, and we definitely put up a fight so we had to be happy.

“Race two was just a great spectacle put on by the Kawasaki team and it was a good clean fight.

“Jonathan was very strong in certain sections of the track and I knew I had to work hard to defend my line.

“To hold on to win gives me great satisfaction.

“It shows that the work done during the winter is paying off, but there are still some issues which we will address before the next round at Aragon.

“But right now we will just enjoy the moment.”

Round three is at the Motorland circuit in three weeks time and also looking forward to the return to Spain will be Fenay Bridge rider Kyle Smith.

The Alicante-based racer picked up his first points of the season in the World Supersport series, having failed to finish in Australia due to a clutch problem, with a fifth place at the Chang Circuit.

Smith had a mixed day as he started from the second row of the grid but a poor start left him back in 12th place.

However, the 24year-old dug deep and was safely in fifth place as Jules Cluzel won the race on the MV Augusta.

“I was a little disappointed to be honest because we had been showing good pace in qualifying,” said Smith.

“I had a disastrous start due to the problem with the clutch.

“But we are happy that once we sort that out we have what it takes to be up there at the front fighting with the leaders.”