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 #4 Porsche 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 Xu (#37 Phantom Global Racing Porsche) 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 Hongli, as well as Picariello who moved up to joint second with six.
Yesterday’s winners Alessandro Ghiretti and Huang Ruohan (#911 Absolute Racing Porsche) completed the podium after the latter passed Tony Ruan Cunfan on the final lap.
KRC’s other BMW, the #10 shared by Brian Lee and Maxime Oosten claimed Silver-Am victory in fifth overall, while Liu Kaishun and Andy Deng Yi moved up 10 positions from where they started to earn Silver class spoils in Winhere Harmony’s #96 Ferrari. Setiawan Santoso and Mike Zhou Bihuang (#8 Climax Racing Mercedes-AMG) won the Am category.
In the China Cup classification, Deng and Yi scored maximum points in Race 2 but still trail early leaders Frank Cheng Congfu and James Yu Kuai by 12.
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 (#89 Team KRC BMW).
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 #500 Nissan throughout the opening stint. Miyake pitted a lap before the other frontrunners, a decision that resulted in his co-driver Takayuki Aoki dropping to fifth once the stops had shaken out.
Ahead, Lu now led Liu by a comfortable ten 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 Aoki and Vutthikorn Inthraphuvasak (#911 Absolute Racing Porsche) 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 #29 Absolute Lamborghini to 10th overall, and the #16 FAW Audi Sport Asia Team Phantom entry retiring with engine issues within sight of the chequered flag.
Andy Tan/Thierry Vermeulen (#98 Absolute Racing Ferrari) and Kiyoshi Uchiyama/Tsubasa Kondo (#25 Porsche Center Okazaki) completed the top eight ahead of Li Lichao and Elias Seppanen (#27 Climax Racing Mercedes-AMG) 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 (#22 Origine Porsche) 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 2-3 May.
