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This is it at last: the long (?) winter is over and here we are again in Sepang.
For your scribe, Malaysia is a bit of a second home, although the circuit that welcomed us was not always the one built by Herman Tilke near Kuala Lumpur airport.
In fact, Malaysia appeared on the scene at Shah Alam and we remember it well because we left with the mechanics working inside sheet metal containers in blast furnace temperatures. We are talking about an old style, atmospheric track...especially for the photographers who were warned to beware of the tall grass in the corners because of snakes.
In that 1991 edition Loris Capirossi (125), Luca Cadalora (250) and John Kocinski (500) won the three races.
At Shah Alam the world championship raced for no less than 7 years, from 1991 to 1997, with very little change in terms of logistics the Italians won no less than 10 Grands Prix with Capirex (1), Gramigni (1), Cadalora (2), Biaggi (4), Perugini (1) and Rossi (1).
What did we do back in the day after the races? Staying in the protected bracket, the top-rated destination was Imbi Plaza, and that was simply because there was a building there, containing hundreds of small stores selling pirated software. At that time in Malaysia copyright did not exist, there was only copy!
All the shops were well-stocked, and if you left them a list you could go home with dozens of floppy disks (remember them?). Then later with the arrival of CDs things got better, but in the early years software was all contained in those 1.44 MB tiles. Then, yes, there was also ChinaTown, for fake purses and Rolexes. The watches were really fake, the handbags, on the other hand, in some cases, for the more expensive ones were actually real because even the big brands were producing around here.
In 1998 the Malaysian GP moved to Johor, and we all remember that mainly because Gino Borsoi during practice killed a cobra with a 'knee slider'. The unfortunate snake was brought back to the pitlane by the circuit workers, and ever since then Gino, now a happy and capable Pramac sporting director after a lifetime alongside Jorge Martinez Aspar, wore the effigy of a cobra on his helmet.
Memoirs of an old scribe, who did not miss a single Malaysian Grand Prix arriving, precisely, at the debut in 1999 of Sepang, which since then has always been the venue for one of the best and highly-awaited races of the year, with the exclusion of the Covid years 2020-1.
But where did we start from?
Age plays strange tricks, you start talking about the Sepang tests that mark the official start of the 2025 season and you get carried away by memories.
We test here, or rather it is more correct to say that we started testing here, because it was the most convenient track for the Japanese racing departments, certainly closer than in Europe, but now with Ducati, Aprilia and KTM playing leading roles the music has changed. Although this year with Honda and Yamaha called upon to catch up, the logistics certainly benefit them.
Testing in Malaysia also means 'shakedowns ,' which, as the word itself explains, are the first laps that test riders take to make sure that the bikes prepared for the factory riders stay together after assembly.
They are actually pre-tests for the test riders and a chance for the rookies, the debutants, to have their first real tests. While last year there was only Pedro Acosta, this year there are three 'debs'. Fermin Aldeguer, with Gresini's Ducati GP24; Ai Ogura, with Trackhouse's Aprilia RS-GP 25; and Somkiat Chandra with the LCR team's Honda RC213-V.
Alongside them will be thoroughbred test riders such as Michele Pirro (Ducati), Dani Pedrosa, Pol Espargarò (KTM), Stefan Bradl might be missing despite having renewed his agreement with HRC, Takaaki Nakagami, Aleix Espargaro (Honda), Lorenzo Savadori (Aprilia), Augusto Fernandez and even Andrea Dovizioso (Yamaha). It should be added that the official riders of Honda and Yamaha, manufacturers with concessions, could also ride.
It remains to be seen, for the latter two, how they will organize themselves since tomorrow and the day after tomorrow they will present their teams in Kuala Lumpur (for Yamaha there is the novelty of Pramac) and in Jakarta, Indonesia, respectively.
We will see how your scribe will manage together with Matteo Aglio to provide you with as much information, photos and videos as possible because from year to year our jerseys get tighter...but we are used to it. Happy reading on GPOne.com, with our LIVE coverage on the website and on Youtube/Facebook and other socials.
