It happened in EWC 2022… #12: Odendaal helps make team boss Lucot’s dream come true

In the final look back to a key 2022 FIM Endurance World Championship moment before the focus switches firmly to the upcoming 2023 season, here’s a reminder of the day when Steven Odendaal helped to make his team boss Yannick Lucot’s dream come true. Along with Florian Alt and Erwan Nigon, Odendaal helped French privateer team Viltaïs Racing – then running under the Viltaïs Racing Igol and using a Yamaha YZF-R1 – to a dramatic victory in the 100th-anniversary Bol d’Or, the deciding round of last year’s EWC.

Ad Following the team’s dramatic first-place finish, Odendaal said: “This race has been incredible. To be in a French team winning on French soil is just something amazing.

Yannick Lucot, my team boss, had a really big dream of this day and my team-mates and I, we fulfilled this so we’re really, really happy with this victory. FIM EWCBring on the “struggle”, says World Superbike racer Gabellini in EWC23/03/2023 AT 09:02 “Obviously we did not expect this, we just knew we had to make everything the maximum and we just did this and finally we’ve got this big trophy, which is amazing, and I’m really happy to walk away with my first EWC podium being a victory.” Viltaïs Racing has switched to Honda power for the 2023 EWC season when it will compete under the Honda Viltaïs Racing banner.

With Nigon announcing his retirement following the Bol d’Or, Lucot has recruited Argentine Leandro Mercado to partner Alt and Odendaal on its #333 Honda CBR1000RR-R Fireblade. James Westmoreland will continue as the fourth rider.

The 24 Heures Motos at Le Mans opens the new EWC campaign from 13-16 April. Pictured from left to right are: James Westmoreland, Steven Odendaal, Yannick Lucot, Erwan Nigon and Florian Alt L’article It happened