Taniguchi takes first indie win at home event

Yukinori Taniguchi won race one in the independents’ category, leading a bamboo-engineering 1-2. With team-mate Darryl O’Young also winning race two, the Hong Kong driver closes up to the independents’ championship lead.

Taniguchi, the fastest of the four-strong Japanese contingent all weekend, drove a careful race avoiding the incidents in the mid-pack to win the race in the Yokohama Trophy for independents’ class in race one. The Japanese driver also managed to fight back past a struggling Tom Coronel, who had picked up damage at the start of the race, and finished in the final overall points position.

“I have to thank the team and people who have supported me,” said Taniguchi.

“I still can’t believe it. It was a tough race as I had to push so hard. I passed Coronel and almost spun, but it was quite fun!”

Darryl O’Young finished second in class in race one, and won in race two to close in to 21 points of Sergio Hernandez in the independents’ category, with double points available at Macau.

“We have had a couple of bad events so it was good to come back with this race. I cut the lead to Sergio (Hernández) by a third and Macau has double points so we’ll see how it goes”