Hickman wins Macau thriller
Peter Hickman brought the curtain down on his brilliant 2018 road racing season with victory in the Macau Grand Prix. The BSB star, who has claimed victories at every international road race this year, beat off a strong challenge from Aspire-Ho team-mate Michael Rutter to win a race cut to eight laps after a crash involving Ben Wylie and Phil Crowe at Fisherman’s brought out the red flags. Neither rider was seriously injured.
Riding the Smith’s prepared BMW S1000RR he steered to victory in the Senior TT and Ulster Grand Prix, Hickman passed Rutter’s RC213V-S Honda on the approach to Mandarin on the third lap and held on to take his third win at the Chinese road race by just 0.795 seconds.
Martin Jessopp finished third in his first ride on the PBM Ducati. It was the Yeovil man’s sixth Macau podium finish without a victory.
Hickman had been over a second faster than anyone else in qualifying and knew the race was his to win. “I didn’t panic when Michael led from the start, but I didn’t want to wait too long to make my move in case I got caught out by a red flag the way I was last year,” Hickman explained. “I planned to lead on the third lap and got a gap and managed it because I didn’t want to wreck my tyre.” Dunlop were the 2018 winners of the annual Macau tyre war, but Metzelermounted Rutter felt things might have been different if the race had run its full distance. The eight-times Macau winner put up a strong fight in his first outing on the exotic Honda after a three-hour and £315 phone call to Honda UK helped his crew chief Alec Teague free up the V4’s traction control system that was too restrictive on the twisty Guia track.
“I could see Peter’s rear tyre was starting to wear and thought I might have a chance if I could keep pushing and maybe force him to make a mistake,” explained the 46-year old, who made his Macau debut in 1994. “But Peter was on rails today.”