Peter Hickman (Aspire-Ho by Bathams BMW) took a full set of firsts away from the Suncity Group Macau Motorcycle Grand Prix – 52nd Edition, converting pole into victory and adding fastest lap to his tally for good measure. He set that time on lap 4 after he decided against following early leader Michael Rutter (Aspire-Ho by Bathams Honda RC213V) any longer, and set off in pursuit of victory instead.

Hickman’s decision may well have been prompted by the fact that Danny Webb (MGM by Penz13 BMW) had taken third place from Gary Johnson (Briggs Equipment Kawasaki) and was closing in on the leading duo.

But Webb’s pursuit faded just as Martin Jessopp on the Tak Chun Group by PBM Ducati decided that he’d settled in nicely and wanted to move up on the leading group before they got away completely. But by the time he got past Johnson and Webb the gap to Rutter and Hickman was all but five seconds and it started growing from then on.

The reason was that Rutter had seen Hickman’s rear Dunlop tyres had started to slide and decided he would have another push. But Hickman merely raised his game as well and began to ease away from Rutter to the extent that, when the red flags were shown on lap 8, he was a second clear. After the race, Rutter declared Hickman to be uncatchable.

The result was declared at that point, leaving Webb an excellent fourth, Gary Johnson fifth and Horst Saiger a creditable sixth. Davey Todd (PuraGlobe Syntainics Racing Oil by Penz 3) finished ninth, once again the best result among the newcomers taking part today.

Said Hickman:

“On the third lap I thought, I’ll get my head down a bit and see if I can break in just a little bit, get a little bit of a gap and see if I can manage it, which was basically what I did. After half distance, I thought I’ll get my head back down again and did a low 24, which pulled the gap back out again. It’s fantastic for me. For Aspire-Ho and Bathams, a win here is absolutely brilliant.”

For Rutter, it was his 19th podium finish since his Macao debut in 1994:

“The bike went off the line absolutely perfectly and I just got in front of Pete into turn 1. I thought, this is not right, it’s not happening! I just got my head down. When he came flying past and I thought I’d stay on the back of him but he pulled so much on me in just one lap, I thought this is just embarrassing this is, I’ll have to get my head down. I started matching him and I felt comfortable. I could see a bit of wear on his rear Dunlop and I thought, that’s not going to last, but he seemed to be keeping the same pace. To be fair to Pete, he was on rails!”

Taking his sixth podium on his tenth visit, victory on the Guia Circuit still eluding him, Jessopp was nonetheless upbeat about this race: