Setting a quite pulsating pace on route to banking pole position for the 52nd Macau Motorcycle Grand Prix, Senior TT champ Peter Hickman reigned supreme in today’s second qualifying session on the unrelenting, technical Macau street course.
Hickman who looked in impressive form during Q1, steadily chipped away with his pace throughout the recent 52 minute qualifying session, which saw him ultimately set a best lap time of 2 minutes 23.904 seconds.
Photo by ID
1.14 seconds behind the on top form Hickman was Aspire Ho/Bathams Racing team mate Michael Rutter (2.25.356), who continues to look more and more competitive aboard the exotic RC213V-S Honda.
Third fastest was Be Wiser Ducati’s Martin Jessopp (2.25.356), just 0.312 of a second behind former event team mate Rutter.
Lee Hardy Racing’s Gary Johnson (2.25.733), under 0.4 of a second behind Jessopp on the timing sheets, marked himself out as unquestionably a strong contender for a rostrum finish on Saturday.
Fifth quickest behind twice TT winner Johnson was IRRC Superbike champion Danny Webb (2.26.352), who continues to quietly impress with his guile, pace, race craft.
There was hardly anything in it lap time wise between sixth, seventh, eighth fastest respectively Horst Saiger (2.27.247), David Johnson (2.27.545) and John McGuinness (2.27.601), whilst ninth quickest Derek Sheils (2.27.814) also kept close proximity with the extremely closely matched trio.
Finalising the overall ten quickest qualifiers was PRL Racing’s Sam West (2.28.690), who held off the challenge of lead newcomer Davey Todd (2.29.423), to scoop tenth place on the time sheets.
Overall qualifying results for the 2018 Suncity Group Macau Grand Prix, are as follows:
1 Peter Hickman 2.23.904
2 Michael Rutter 2.25.044
3 Martin Jessopp 2.25.356
4 Gary Johnson 2.25.733
5 Danny Webb 2.26.352
6 Horst Saiger 2.27.247
7 David Johnson 2.27.545
8 John McGuinness 2.27.601
9 Derek Sheils 2.27.814
10 Sam West 2.28.690
11 Davey Todd 2.29.423
12 Didier Grams 2.29.448
13 Marek Cerveny 2.29.985
14 Michael Sweeney 2.30.577
15 Ben Wylie 2.30.776
16 Erno Kostamo 2.30.993
17 Paul Jordan 2.31.195
18 Rob Hodson 2.31.767
19 Phil Crowe 2.32.027
20 Steve Heneghan 2.32.162
21 Andre Pires 2.33.841
22 Craig Neve 2.34.517
23 Dominic Herbertson 2.34.819
24 Daley Mathison 2.35.973
25 Davy Morgan 2.37.958
26 Xavier Denis 2.38.469
Words by Stevie Rial