How a Trip to Thailand Put Shark Leathers on the 2026 Yamaha R3 bLU cRU Asia-Pacific Grid

This weekend at The Bend Motorsport Park, nineteen riders from across the Asia-Pacific will line up for Round 2 of the 2026 Yamaha R3 bLU cRU Asia-Pacific Championship. Eight of them are Australian. One is from New Zealand. All nineteen will be wearing custom race suits built for them by Shark Leathers. We thought it was worth telling you how that happened, because the story is not a sponsorship deal. It started with a trip to Thailand.

A weekend in Thailand

A few years back I was in Thailand around the time one of the rounds was running, so I went along to watch. I knew there was an Australian on the grid, Taiyo Aksu, and I wanted to see how he was getting on. Taiyo was racing 300's in Australia in the ASBK field, before he moved to Japan and wild carded in the Thailand round of the series and now to the World Superbike Championship in the all new Sportsbike grid in Europe. He has been wearing Shark suits for the last 2 seasons and we are proud to be a part of his journey.

Taiyo Aksu - Assen WSBK Round 2 Grid

What I did not expect was the programme around the riders. I have been around motorcycle racing for a long time. I have never seen anything like what Yamaha is putting these kids through. It is not a series, it is a development academy. Riding lessons, sure. But also fitness programmes built for racing, mental coaching, structured drills, dedicated rider coaches working on Data & Video. They are not teaching them to ride a motorbike. They are teaching them to be future stars.

I spent a lot of that weekend watching, asking questions, and meeting the people running it. I got introduced to a few of the Yamaha staff and event coordinators who put the series together. By the end of the weekend a conversation had started. I know that Australia needed something like this and also they were curious about Australia. We have the tracks, we have the talent, we have an established national series. There was no reason an Australian round could not work.

When I got home, I reached out to Peter Doyle, President of Motorcycling Australia & Simon Mass, Sporting Director of Motorcycling Austrlia, and made the introduction. From there it moved fast. The bLU cRU Asia-Pacific team came out the next year to look at our circuits. The kids who came over were taken aback by how good the racing was here. One round became two. Now in 2026, we have two Australian rounds and eight Australian riders inside the championship.

What the bLU cRU Asia-Pacific Championship actually is

The series is six rounds across the region. Two in Australia, plus Indonesia, Japan, and Thailand. The grid is nineteen riders aged from their early teens to their early twenties, drawn from China, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, plus our eight Australians and one rider from New Zealand. All of them are on identical Yamaha R3s. The racing is genuinely world class. It was upgraded to FIM World Cup status in 2024.

• Round 1 - Sydney Motorsport Park, Australia, 27-28 March
• Round 2 - The Bend Motorsport Park, Australia, 1-3 May
• Round 3 - Pertamina Mandalika, Indonesia, 17-19 July
• Round 4 - Mobility Resort Motegi, Japan, 5-6 September
• Round 5 - Chang International Circuit, Thailand, 13-15 November
• Round 6 - Chang International Circuit, Thailand, 19-22 November

Teeranai Tabtim, Farres Fadhill, and Rossi McAdams powering through Sydney Motorsport Park at Round 1

After Round 1 at Sydney Motorsport Park in March, our own Connor Lewis is leading the championship on 45 points. Malaysia's F. Fadhill is sitting second on 38. Rossi McAdam is third on 32. The current Australian field also includes Ghage Plowman, Alexander Codey, Hunter Corney, Jed Louis, Adam Jordan, and Phoenix O'Brien. Hunter Charlett flies the New Zealand flag.

Round 2 lands at The Bend this weekend, alongside the Australian Superbike Championship. It is one of the few weekends of the year where you can stand on a hill and watch ASBK and a future MotoGP feeder grid race back to back.

The pathway: from a national paddock to MotoGP

This is the part that makes the bLU cRU programme different from a regular junior series. It is the bottom step of a defined ladder.

The pathway runs from national racing into regional R3 championships. From there into the FIM R3 bLU cRU World Cup, which runs twelve races across six European WorldSBK rounds. From the World Cup the top performers move into the FIM Sportbike World Championship, then WorldSSP. From WorldSSP, the established route is into either WorldSBK or the Pramac Yamaha Moto2 squad, and from there into MotoGP. It is not theoretical. Yamaha has built every step.

Eight Australians are now standing on the first rung of that same ladder. That is what makes this round at The Bend worth your attention.

Why the suits matter at this level

Once a rider steps into FIM regulated racing, the suit is no longer just something off the shelf. It must meet FIM approval requirements for competition, while also being built to perform under the demands of the track. That means high quality materials, reinforced construction, and protection designed for real world riding conditions. Just as important is the fit, because protection only works properly when it stays exactly where it is meant to.

Shark Leathers earned FIM homologation in September 2023. Every rider on the bLU cRU Asia Pacific grid competes in a custom fitted suit built to that standard, tailored to the individual and engineered to work seamlessly with the Alpinestars Tech Air system. While spare suits are on hand if needed, the grid itself is built around precision fit, with all nineteen riders equipped in custom suits.

Round 2 at The Bend

Connor Lewis - Current Championship Leader

The race weekend runs Friday through Sunday, 1st to the 3rd of May, alongside the ASBK Round 2 programme. Connor Lewis comes in as the championship leader after a dominant Round 1. Hunter Corney, who won as a thirteen year old wildcard in 2024, will be looking to convert local knowledge of The Bend into a result. Rossi McAdam sits as a podium contender too.

If you are heading to The Bend, you will see the bLU cRU team in action as part of the support programme. The setup reflects a true international racing operation, with a level of professionalism you would expect at the top tiers of the sport. Despite travelling across countries, the team delivers a consistent, world class presence at every round, from the paddock through to pit lane.

The bigger picture

For Shark Leathers, being on this grid is not a marketing line. It is the result of a conversation that started in a Thai paddock and developed into a working partnership over several years. We build and supply the suits for the programme, working alongside Yamaha, who runs the academy, with Motorcycling Australia and the regional federations sanctioning the rounds. Every part has a job.

The number that matters most to us is eight. Eight Australian riders racing a championship that did not exist on home soil three years ago, on a pathway that has a real endpoint inside MotoGP. A few of them will get far. A few will not. But all of them are riding inside a system that gives them a real chance, and that is something this country has been short of for a long time.

You can follow the championship at yamahablucruasiapacific.com. The Australian riders' progress is tracked through ASBK and Motorcycling Australia. We will be at The Bend this weekend. If you are too, come find us.