Aldi Satya Mahendra came back from the disappointment of finishing seven-thousands of a second behind the winner on Saturday to take a superb victory on Sunday at the Misano World Circuit – Marco Simoncelli.
The Indonesian star, who made his full-time debut in WorldSSP300 this season after competing in the R3 bLU cRU World Cup, started Race 2 from 10th based on the Race 1 lap times, but by the sixth lap the 18-year-old had reached second place. From there he engaged in a fight for the lead, putting in several great passes to stay up front. Mahendra controlled the final lap perfectly, holding off his rivals to cross the line a tenth ahead and take his second career WorldSSP300 victory, as well as moving into second place in the standings, 12 points from the top.
2023 R3 bLU cRU champion Emiliano Ercolani (Yamaha Motoxracing WorldSSP300 Team) put a Race 1 DNF behind him to put together a great Race 2 and take his best WorldSSP300 result in 11th.
Galang Hendra Pratama (ProGP NitiRacing) finished fourth, a nice reward for the Indonesian after a disappointing Saturday which saw him crash out. Marco Gaggi (Team BrCorse) grabbed fifth place at his home race, while fellow Yamaha riders David Salvador (MS Racing) and Elia Bartolini (Yamaha Motoxracing WorldSSP300 Team) scored sixth and eighth respectively.
Aldi Satya Mahendra: “I’m very happy today because I started from 10th position, it wasn’t easy for me, and also there was a little problem with my rear brake. Yesterday I was close, only +0.007 from the win! Today I was able to make up for it all and on the last lap I remembered that last year in R3 bLU cRU I was very strong in the last corner so I tried to repeat it again and finally I was able to get my first victory of the season.”
