Solid Macau Grand Prix for Honda Racing

The 2016 international road racing season wrapped up this weekend with the 50th Macau Grand Prix. Honda Racing’s John McGuinness and Conor Cummins finished their season aboard the Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP in the top-ten.

With practice starting on Thursday both McGuinness and Cummins enjoyed getting back out at the 3.8-mile Guia street circuit, after a successful outing last year. With quick times on the sheets McGuinness was fifth fastest and Cummins tenth in the day’s opening practice.

The first qualifying session saw lighting fast pace, with both Honda riders taking around five seconds off their practice times. Friday saw the second and final qualifying take place and again with fast times all-round the combined times placed McGuinness eighth (2:26.358) and Cummins ninth (2:26.582) on the grid ahead of Saturday’s race.

Race ready and with 12 laps of the Macau circuit ahead of them, the Morecambe Missile and the Ramsey Rocket knew competition would be high and from the start it was wheel-to-wheel racing action.

Pushing hard and rubbing shoulders with the Armco, both McGuinness and Cummins lost places in the early stages. However, towards the end of the race both moved up through the field. Crossing the line Cummins took fourth place with McGuinness seventh. The 2016 Macau Grand Prix was won by Peter Hickman.