Capping off a stellar season, Southland’s Cormac Buchanan secured a third podium and clinched fifth overall in the FIM JuniorGP World Championship yesterday.
Buchanan, who will move up to the Moto3 World Championship in 2025, delivered an epic performance to secure second in the opening race at Estoril.
Tussling at the front throughout, Buchanan punched out of the final corner and dominated the fight to the finish line, missing the win by just 0.048 seconds to Guido Pini, of Italy.
“I’m really happy with today – it feels like I saved my best JuniorGP races until the very end. There is no better feeling than seeing that New Zealand flag raised above the podium,” he said.
“It was a such a nice way to sign off with my AGR team and reward them for the last three years together. They have made me into the rider I am today and I feel ready to fight it out in the world championship.
“We managed the race really well. It almost felt like I was riding around knowing I had the race under control. Although, when I was sixth going into the last corner, I knew that I just had to close the eyes, as they say, and push. Thankfully it was enough to cross the line in second and so agonisingly close to my first win in Europe.”
Buchanan was again in the mix throughout race two, leading in stages and never more than a second from the front, but was forced to settle for seventh across the line. He was then demoted one place for breaching track limits.
“It was another good race and I felt really calm. Unfortunately, I kept getting sucked into the slipstream under braking and it meant I had to do a lot of work to recover. In the end we just ran out of laps and I got punted wide in the last lap and got demoted for that.”
A strong points haul in the final round boosted him up the championship ranks to fifth equal overall, just one point from fourth.
“That track limits proved especially costly in the end but fifth in the world is an incredible result for this season. We were in the hunt for top three overall right until that last lap,” he said.
“We came into the weekend 16 points adrift from second in the championship and by the end of the first race we were just four points behind so it really demonstrates the step we have made this season, particularly in that mental space, to handle the intensity and pressure.
“This is the pinnacle of racing in the world – the next step literally is the MotoGP world championship – so to be here representing New Zealand makes me incredibly proud.”
