World Superbike rider, Michael van der Mark, returned to the Suzuka 8 Hours with the factory BMW squad.

For the first time since 2019, Michael van der Mark was back in action at the Suzuka 8 Hours with the BMW Motorrad World Endurance Team.

The Dutch rider was left happy with a fifth-place finish at the iconic event, but knows that more was possible for the German manufacturer.

In the second hour of the race, van der Mark had his first stint out on track on the BMW M1000RR and was running in third place. However, he ended up crashing his #37 machine after his footpeg fell off and he crashed on his way to the pit lane.

After the unexpected pit stop to fix the issues, the factory BMW entry had dropped outside of the top twenty. But van der Mark, Markus Reiterberger and Steven Odendaal put in a valiant effort to return to the top five.

"I had a very good race week here with the BMW Motorrad World Endurance Team," van der Mark said after the Suzuka 8 Hours.

"We were doing this race for Sylvain, Luca and the family. It was special. We tried as much as we could and I think especially at the beginning of the race we had a podium pace.

"We were in P3 but a bit unlucky with a technical failure and then a crash where we lost a lot of time. But the team showed proper endurance spirit, they repaired the bike, Steven and Markus were fast, the whole team did fantastic pit stops. And then I just did my thing.

"It was painful, it was tough, but I think we should be happy with P5 here at Suzuka after the crash and after we lost a lot of time."

The factory BMW Motorrad World Endurance Team now finds themselves in second in the FIM Endurance World Championship, only a single point behind the YART - Yamaha squad.