12/11/2023

Veijer crowns Intact GP double podium with his debut victory

It was THE weekend for the LIQUI MOLY Husqvarna Intact GP Moto3 team. Both Collin Veijer and Ayumu Sasaki fought a brilliant battle for the lead in Malaysia, from which the rookie emerged with his debut victory, making history as the first Dutch winner since Hans Spaan in 1990. The Japanese reduced his championship deficit to 13 points with his second place.

The Malaysia Grand Prix at the Sepang International Circuit increasingly developed into a top-class thriller, in which the Husqvarna duo took the lead in constant rotation. Besieged by the world championship leader, Jaume Masia, both riders from the German racing team kept a cool head.
First and foremost: Collin Veijer. Just two weeks after his debut podium, the 18-year-old Moto3 rookie followed up with his debut victory. In the course of the race, which he started from P2, there were countless overtaking manoeuvres at the very front. The youngster always managed to make clean manoeuvres and also supported and protected his team-mate Sasaki as good as possible. In the end, Veijer put all on one card, overtook his team-mate and ultimately finished the 15-lap heat battle as a new Grand Prix winner.

Ayumu Sasaki, who is in the middle of the title fight, managed to keep Jaume Masia at bay on the 5.54 km Malaysian race track after a lot of leading work and numerous heated slipstream duels. This second place reduced his championship deficit to just thirteen points two races before the season finale. The finish was a very close call with just a 0.066s gap to his team-mate, but in just one week's time, from the 17th to the 19th of November, the Japanese rider will get his next chance to continue his title mission in Qatar.

Results

Race
1. Collin VEIJER/ NED/ HUSQVARNA
2. Ayumu SASAKI/ JAP/ HUSQVARNA – (+0.066)
3. Jaume MASIA/ SPA/ HONDA – (+0.328)

World Championship
1. Jaume MASIA/ SPA/ – 246
2. Ayumu SASAKI/ JAP – 233 (-13)
3. David Alonso/ SPA - 205 (-41)
8. Collin VEIJER/ NED – 130 (-116)

Team classification
1. LIQUI MOLY HUSQVARNA INTACT GP – 363
2. LEOPARD RACING – 318 (- 45)
3. RED BULL KTM AJO – 306 (- 57)

Ayumu Sasaki

P2 - (+0.066)
Moto3 World Championship 2023 - P2 - 233 Points

"I think I had a great race. I was leading a lot, controlling the pace while trying to manage the tyres. I knew that Jaume Masia and my team-mate were with me and in turn 8 on the last lap I didn't expect Collin to overtake me there. I didn't brake that late, otherwise I could have been more 'there'. Nevertheless, we have reduced the gap in the championship and still have two races to go. We will give our maximum."

Collin Veijer

P1
Moto3 World Championship 2023 - P8 - 130 Points

"I feel great! It was incredibly exhausting! It was a great race and I tried to stay at the front as much as I could. At one point I had to attack my team-mate because otherwise, the group behind me would have overtaken me as well. In the end, we achieved a 1:1 for our team and I'm very happy about that. I would like to thank the whole team for their tireless help."

Peter Öttl

Team Manager

"It was a great day for our Moto3 team and the second double victory for Husqvarna after our triumph last year here at the same venue. However, the weekend started anything but easy. It was a new track for Collin, and we had to make a lot of adjustments to the set-up on Ayumu's bike. Nevertheless, we were competitive again until qualifying, as Collin's second place on the grid and P5 for Ayumu showed, although we knew that much more was possible with Ayumu. Still, first and second row on the grid was a great team success and gave us confidence that we would be very competitive if we could fix all of Ayumu's problems before the race, while Collin's strong consistency gave us high hopes of a strong result. To finish today's race day with a one-two is the maximum a team can achieve. We have extended our lead in the team standings, which is very pleasing. But more importantly, Ayumu was able to close the gap in the championship again. It's never easy to determine the order of your own riders, and today it was a race in which Collin always did his best from start to finish to help Ayumu, but also had to watch his own race so as not to jeopardize his own top result. In the end he managed it very well, because in such a close race it's hard to know which rider is behind him. But we are very happy and proud of our two riders. With this double victory, we are one step closer to our goal of keeping the championship open until Valencia. Hopefully we can say the same in Doha in a week's time so that we can fight for the title in Valencia. But before that, congratulations once again to Collin and Ayumu on their strong performance today!"

Malaysia GP 2023 – Sunday Moto3

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