PJ Jacobsen finished today’s sixth-round FIM Supersport World Championship race in fourth place at the Sepang International Circuit after running out of laps following an outstanding comeback in the latter stages of the 14-lap wet encounter. Despite missing out on a podium finish by less than three tenths of a second, the Honda WorldSSP Team’s rider moves up one place in the championship standings and now sits fifth.

After a by-the-book initial starting procedure, with a wet race declared and drops of rain falling in sector two, the rain intensified and all riders chose to change the rear tyre according to the new weather conditions. The overall length of the race was reduced by one lap (from 14 to 13) and the riders went for a second warm-up lap, before red flags were deployed when the rain then came down heavily.

The race finally got underway at 17:15, almost three hours later, as it was scheduled after the World Superbike race 2. Jacobsen lost a couple of places on the opening lap and struggled with a lack of visibility, especially in the early part of the encounter. After getting the better of Kenan Sofuoglu for fourth place, in the final three laps the 22-year-old American put together an outstanding recovery as he bridged the gap to the front-runners by lapping one second faster than his rivals ahead. On the final lap, Jacobsen was simply just not close enough to get in the mix for podium placings.