Xaus and Craggill were also amongst the fast boys this morning and these horrific conditions might throw up a surprise like they did last year when Anthony Gobert took the win on the Bimota.

Conditions for the start of the race are even worse now than what they were in the warm-up this morning.  

The crowd is brave, strong in numbers and will obviously be cheering for a home win.

They are off - Okada leads them through turn 1 but Bayliss soon took him for the lead, Edwards 3rd, and South Australia's Steve Martin in 4th.  Bostrom 5th, then Laconi & Chambon.

Edwards and Okada side by side down the main straight both spinning up even in a straight line at nearly 260kph as the conditions are that bad.  

Lap 2, Edwards through on Bayliss for the lead around Siberia.  Edwards Bayliss, Okada, Martin, Yanagawa, Izutsu, Parkes, Xaus, Chili, Chambon, Laconi, Lavilla, Bostrom, Corser is the race order as they start lap 3.  Hodgson slides off the track.

Okada is hounding Bayliss now as world champion Colin Edwards opens a little gap over his pursuers.

As they start lap 4 Edwards has 2 seconds over the Bayliss/Okada duo.  Yanagawa has pushed Steve Martin back to 5th.  Corser is struggling back in 16th with Bostrom right behind him.

Okada through on Bayliss for 2nd, can the Japanese rider actually have a bit of luck today and not have any mechanical gremlins beset his machine?

Bayliss back through on Okada for 2nd.  Izutsu in the dirt.  Top ten - Edwards, Bayliss, Okada, Yanagawa, Parkes, Xaus, Martin, Chili, Laconi.

As they start lap 6 Edwards is stamping his dominance in these conditions with a 6.5 second lead.  Top ten - Edwards, Bayliss, Okada, Xaus, Yanagawa, Parkes, Martin, Chili, Borja, Lavilla.  Edwards is running 47s in these atrocious conditions, amazing.

Parkes through on Yanagawa for 5th with 15 laps to go.  Edwards nearly has nearly a 10 second lead.  Xaus the first man into the 46s but is sitting in 4th place some 8 seconds behind Bayliss and Okada.

Xaus is rapidly closing in on Okada and Bayliss, and running a full second faster than race leader Edwards who is 16 seconds ahead of the Spaniard but within striking distance if Xaus continues to run at this speed.  That buggered it, Xaus must have come to grief somewhere over the back of the circuit as he has disappeared from the timing monitors.

The gap between race leader Edwards and second placed Bayliss is steady at around 11 seconds.  Young Broc Parkes is in 4th, this ride will make many who thought that he maybe did not deserve a World SuperBike ride sit up and take notice.  Corser is in 11th with 12 laps to run.

I definitely put the mockers on the young Parkes though, as just after I finished typing that sentence and was thinking about podiums he came to grief and ended up in the grass.  But remounted after losing around 30 seconds but the gap between the riders was so large that he only lost one place even though both him and his bike slid separate ways on the grass, amazing stuff.  Parkes is back on track and must have a destroyed rear tyre as he just saved another big slide out of Honda Corner.

Edwards has opened up his lead a little further, now 13 seconds in front with 10 laps to go.  The leaders have lapped many riders now, including Hodgson & Toseland.

Okada through on Bayliss for 2nd and immediately opens a gap over the Australian.

8 laps to run - top ten - Edwards, Okada, Bayliss, Yanagawa, Parkes, Bussei, Corser, Chili, Martin, Chambon.  Lavilla came down hard.

Okada has closed 2 seconds on Edwards over the last couple of laps but the Texan still has over 11 seconds on his Japanese team-mate and is probably just sitting at a comfortable pace and keeping an eye on the gap shown in his pit-board.

Bussei in the dirt after losing the front into Honda.  5 laps to go and the top ten now is - Edwards, Okada, Bayliss, Yanagawa, Parkes, Corser, Chili, Chambon, Bussei, Martin.

Edwards just lapped his American compatriot Bostrom and has lapped everyone from 11th back.

3 laps to run - Edwards, Okada, Bayliss, Yanagawa, Parkes, Corser, Chili, Chambon, Ulm, Martin.

Martin is in trouble as his bike sounded like it had some serious problems that time down the straight and was some 70kph slower than the leaders.  A pity that a mechanical problem may end up costing the team a points finish.

Final lap - Edwards has dominated here today, from warm-up this morning and all of race 1 he has looked untouchable.  Is there any hope for the others in race 2?

NB:  Race 2 was cancelled due to inclement weather.