News 25 Feb 2018

Maxwell strikes back in second Phillip Island ASBK battle

Another commanding Supersport win for Toparis this morning.

Image: Marc Jones (Foremost Media).

Yamaha Racing Team’s Wayne Maxwell pushed to a vital victory in race two of the Yamaha Motor Finance Australian Superbike Championship at Phillip Island this morning, rebounding from his crash in the opening race.

Maxwell put his YZF-R1M into the lead on lap four of 12 to eventually win by 0.935s from early leader Josh Waters (Team Suzuki Ecstar), as Bryan Staring (Kawasaki BCperformance) took third.

While Maxwell and Waters duelled it out at the front, the battle for the final podium including Staring, race one winner Troy Herfoss (Penrite Honda Racing), Troy Bayliss (DesmoSport Ducati) and Daniel Falzon (Yamaha Racing Team) took much of the attention – ultimately ending in that order, split by just eight-tenths across the line.

Seventh was another strong performance for Michael Blair (Gosford Classic Car Museum Yamaha), directly ahead of Matt Walters (Swann Insurance Kawasaki), Glenn Allerton (Next Gen Motorsports BMW) – battered from Saturday’s incident – and Aaron Morris (Maxima Yamaha), rounding out the top 10.

Casualties in the race included Corey Turner (Brisbane Motorcycles Suzuki) and international Mike Jones (Kawasaki), both crashing out early on. Waters’ factory Suzuki teammate Mark Chiodo also went down, but the rookie managed to remount for 25th.

In Kawasaki Supersport it was Cube Racing’s Tom Toparis (Kawasaki) who made it two from two, winning by 8.475s from Cru Halliday (Yamaha Racing Team) and Nic Liminton (Yamaha), six seconds in arrears for the two-part race. Broc Pearson (Yamaha) and Damon Rees (Honda) filled the top five, while Max Croker (Suzuki) was a notable non-finisher.

Earlier, the top five finishers in the hard-fought YMF R3 Cup were separated by just 0.345s at the conclusion of eight laps on their Yamahas, as Zac Levy edged out Tom Bramich, Locky Taylor, Harry Khouri and Hunter Ford in the race for the line.

Detailed results

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