A rain hit inaugural FIM EWC 8 Hour of Sepang ended in a stunning victory for the Yamaha Austria team and their tyre technical partners at Bridgestone.
Heavy rain delayed the start of the race, and once things did get going, the action was soon suspended once again.
There was plenty of drama throughout the shortened race with crashes, exciting duels and much swapping of the lead. However, there was one rider who really stood out from the crowd this weekend, and that was Yamaha Austria’s Niccolò Canepa.
With the heavy rain making for some very difficult race conditions, Canepa took sole on-track responsibility for YART as their fastest and most experienced rider when it comes to racing in bad weather.
Despite an electronics scare early on, Canepa was definitely a man on a mission as he worked his way up the field after dropping back initially to 34th place to take a stunning victory.
Making it a Bridgestone 1-2 on the podium were the Honda Asia Dream Racing with Showa team, who ran a consistent race inside the top ten throughout and took their chance when the time came.
With that result, Yamaha now lead the constructors championship, and YART climb to 4th in the team championship, making up for their DNF in the opening round at the Circuit Paul Ricard.
