> Liu/Boccolacci and Huang/Ghiretti complete Porsche podium sweep
> KRC, Harmony and Climax take class wins
> Result: Sepang Race 2
Lu Wei scored his seventh career GT World Challenge Asia powered by AWS victory – a new series record – alongside Alessio Picariello in the second of this weekend’s races at Sepang.
Origine’s 911 GT3 R Evo headed a Porsche podium lockout after Picariello jumped pole man Bastian Buus at the start before edging clear of the chasing pack. Anthony Liu more than halved his deficit to Lu after replacing Phantom co-driver Dorian Boccolacci but still ultimately finished four seconds behind the winners.
Lu now has one more win than compatriots Liu, Bob Yuan and Leo Ye, as well as Picariello who moved up to joint second with six.
Yesterday’s winners Alessandro Ghiretti and Huang Ruohan (Absolute Racing) completed the podium after the latter passed Tony Ruan on the final lap.
KRC’s other BMW shared by Brian Lee and Maxime Oosten claimed Silver-Am victory in fifth overall, while Liu Kaishun and Deng Yi moved up 10 positions from where they started to earn Silver class spoils in Winhere Harmony’s Ferrari. Setiawan Santoso and Zhou Bi Huang (Climax Racing) won the Am category.
In the China Cup classification, Deng and Yi scored maximum points in Race 2 but still trail early leaders Cheng and Yu by 12.
ORIGINE BACK ON TOP
Buus’s qualifying pace counted for little when he was swallowed up on the run to Turn 1 by Picariello, the other Absolute Porsche driven by Ghiretti, Atsushi Miyake’s Nissan, Boccolacci and Neil Verhagen (Team KRC).
The top six remained unchanged until the pitstops where Ghiretti and Huang’s 15-second success penalty dropped their Porsche behind Phantom’s 911, which had hassled 5ZIGEN’s Nissan throughout the opening stint. Miyake pitted a lap before the other frontrunners, a decision that resulted in his co-driver Takayuki Ayoki dropping to fifth once the stops had shaken out.
Ahead, Lu now led Liu by a comfortable 10 seconds. The former champion consistently chipped away at that margin but ran out of laps to mount a serious victory challenge.
Behind, Ruan spent the entire stint fending off Huang but was denied an overall and Pro-Am podium on the final lap. Today’s third place plus victory on Saturday leaves Absolute’s crew seven points clear of Lu and Picariello at the top of the overall standings.
A collision between Ayoki and Vutthikorn Inthraphuvasak promoted Lee and Oosten to fifth overall, while Winhere Harmony’s Ferrari bounced back from yesterday’s DNF and row eight starting slot to finish sixth overall and first of the Silver entries. Deng and Liu’s cause was aided by class rival Akash Nandy serving considerable extra pitstop time, which restricted the Absolute Lamborghini to 10th overall, and the FAW Audi Sport Asia Team Phantom entry retiring with engine issues within sight of the chequered flag.
Andy Tan/Thierry Vermeulen and Kiyoshi Uchiyama/Tsubasa Kondo completed the top eight ahead of Li Lichao and Elias Seppanen who fought back from being spun around by Jaxon Evans in the opening stint.
Further back, Santoso and Zhou got the better of yesterday’s class winners Wang Zhongwei and Liu Hangcheng to take a first Am victory together.
The 2026 GT World Challenge Asia powered by AWS season continues in the tropical paradise of Mandalika on May 2-3.
