Maverick Viñales takes victory in Malaysia
The Páginas Amarillas HP 40 rider Maverick Viñales returned to dominate the Malaysian Moto2 race from start to finish and won his second consecutive GP, the fourth so far this season.
Rookie of the year Viñales, made a good start and during the first lap was placed third at the wheel of Mika Kallio. The protégée of Sito Pons had got a good rhythm on the previous day and attacked the race with one clear goal: victory.
On lap nine Kallio had overtaken race leader Rabat and Maverick did the same in the next corner. Kallio picked up the pace and they put some distance between themselves and Rabat and Aegerter in third and fourth.
Waiting his turn, Maverick stayed glued to the Fins back wheel. With six laps to go, Viñales decided it was time for his attack on Kallio, a move that ultimately would earn him the fourth win of the season.
With this win, Viñales so far has a total of 9 podiums under his belt and his points total surpasses the record for a rookie in the category held previously by Marc Marquez with 251 points, compared to 274 points for the Páginas Amarillas HP 40 rider.
More difficult was the race for teammate Luis Salom, who involved in a first lap incident in which he was hit by another rider and lost many positions. Salom started from sixteenth position on the grid and the first lap he completed thirty-first. Luis concentrated on gaining ground.
It was a tough race because of the weather but that didn’t prevent Salom from making up a total of twenty positions to finish eleventh.
Maverick Viñales – 1st place
It has been a tough race, probably the toughest of all so far because the conditions were extreme. The tactic we hd prepared with the team was to go very easy on the gas during the early stages to avoid having problems with the rear tyre and it worked perfectly. From halfwy through the race I started to ride a little more aggressively and with six laps to go, I decided to go for the attack. I managed to open a gap to Kallio and win this race. I am very happy that everything worked perfectly. The team and I are doing a great job and this is allowing us to do a very good season finale. In Valencia I hope to have a good race as a farewell to the category.
Luis Salom – 11th place
It was a very difficult race because at the beginning a rider fell in front of me and I lost many positions. I started to make up positions slowly and in the end I managed to finish eleventh. This was not our goal because I think that with the pace we had, I could have ended in the top six. Now we have to think about Valencia where I want to have a good race and where hopefully luck will be more on our side.
Source: Pons Racing
