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Friday, August 15: Indonesian teenage sensation Boanerges Ratag will take a 16-point lead in the 2025 UIM-ABP Class Pro World Endurance Championship into the final Moto of the Grand Prix of Indonesia on Friday morning.
Third place for the 16-year-old Jakarta student in Moto 5 and cruel engine problems for his closest rival Lino Araùjo mean that the rookie stands on the verge of becoming the first ever Indonesian rider to win a World Championship. While Ratag delighted the home crowds and protected his championship lead, American racer Jay Finlinson overhauled Melbourne-based Kiwi Kylie Ellmers to take an 18.974-second victory after 28 laps of the morning’s opening Moto.
Finlinson now has a five-point lead over Araùjo in the battle for the runner-up spot in the World Championship with Ellmers also in contention for a podium in fourth.
Finlinson said: “I came out third on the start and stayed in there the whole time. One of the guys (Lino) broke and I got a position there and Kylie got tired and I got out in front. It was a perfect race. I think I’m doing pretty good before the last race.”
Ellmers added: “It was alright. After I saw Lino had problems, I managed to get in front of him. When I was coming down to the lappers, I played with my trim. I was getting too much sideways movement and that allowed 55 (Finlinson) to come back at me. By the time I worked out what was causing the issue, he’d checked out, but I did enough to hold 69 (Ratag) off.”
Ratag and Araùjo were separated by just one point at the start of the fifth and penultimate Moto on Lake Toba. Finlinson had a four-point cushion over Bailey Cunningham in the tussle for third place with Ellmers a further four points adrift in fifth.
Seventeen riders took the regatta start for the 40-minute Moto. Engine issues kept György Kasza out of the heat and Trinity Ratat, Mario Lamy, Rasmus Koch Hansen and Isahai Hajime were also non-starters.
Araùjo snatched the hole shot from Finlinson, Ellmers, Ratag, Makaio Wimylie, Scott Phillips and Adrian Herias Fernandez and the Portuguese began to edge away from his rivals, as Ellmers stormed into second place at the expense of Finlinson. Ratag settled into fourth place but the Indonesian hot shot needed to improve on that to stay on Araùjo’s coat tails before the final Moto.
Ellmers was in inspired form and began to apply the pressure on Araùjo, as Phillips snatched fifth from Wimylie. Australian Bailey Cunningham was languishing down in 10th place. Ellmers found a way past the leader heading into lap five and edged away in her quest to finish this year’s World Championship on the podium.
But Araùjo was in trouble with a technical issue and the Portuguese ceded second place to Finlinson on lap seven and was also passed by Ratag. Phillips, Fernandez, American veteran Anthony Radetic, Kanina Ramadhina, Cunningham and Hilman Kurniawan rounded off the top 10 positions. Araùjo then lost fourth to Phillips and headed into the remaining 25 minutes of the Moto languishing in fifth.
But it got much worse for the Portuguese when he ground to a halt on lap 10 and then managed to restart his engine. But the time delay had pushed the luckless Araùjo down to 13th of the 17 runners. Ellmers headed into the second half of the race trying to defend a 7.632-second cushion over Finlinson with Ratag in third.
Araùjo stopped on the course yet again and his cruel luck thrust the spotlight on to Ratag and his relentless push towards the World Endurance Championship title. The Indonesian retained third, while Araùjo slipped back again to 15th and then pulled out altogether after 12 laps.
Finlinson began to apply the pressure on Ellmers as the duo not only battled for the heat win but also for a podium place in the World Championship. The American found a way through on lap 18. Ratag, Phillips, Radetic and Fernandez held top six positions to the finish with Kurniawan, Ramadhina, Pramudya Kumara and Fikri Rajab wrapping up the top 10. Cunningham was 11th but Anderson Dos Santos slipped to 16th after incurring a one-lap penalty for impeding other riders and an additional 30 seconds for a jump start.
The 2025 UIM-ABP Class Pro World Endurance Championship will now be decided in Moto 6, starting at 10.30hrs (local time) today.