Inguito, Mauricio dominate scooter races

MANILA, Philippines — Defending champions John Emerson Inguito and Gian Carlo Mauricio picked up where they left off last season as they ruled the kickoff leg of their respective bike series in the 2019 Petron National Motorcycle Racing Championships at the Batangas Racing Circuit in Rosario, Batangas recently.

Inguito powered in front with the quickest time of one minute and 56.33 seconds in the second lap, briefly lost the lead twice before puling ahead of RR Espiritu going to the eighth and last lap and topping the Expert class of the FDR Philippine Underbone King series.

Inguito timed 15:32.364 around the sleek 3.7-kilometer BRC track on his Yamaha Sniper 150, a huge 5.108 seconds clear of Espiritu, with Herbert Lopez making it a 1-2-3 Yamaha finish, 0.035 of a second farher back. Kerwin Chang settled for fourth overall but clinched the Intermediate title, followed by Johnlery Enriquez.

It would have been a double victory for Inguito were it not for Mauricio’s decisive lunge at the finish in the opening leg of the FDR Philippine Scooter Racing Championship.

Mauricio, the teenaged dynamo from Binangonan, Rizal, yielded the front to Inguito in the fifth lap and then seized it back at the last gasp to win by 0.004 of a second in 15:23.989 on a Yamaha Mio. Dustin Esguerra finished third, 56.534 seconds off the pace, followed by Espiritu and John Paul Capili.

In other competitions, Jakob Sablaya swept Races 1 and 2 of the Honda Pilipinas Dream Cup, Joseph Purino topped the Moto IR, John Paulo Capili and Purino shared top honors in Races 1 and 2 of the MTRT Clubrace and Leeandro Paredes won the Yamaha One Make race.