The #777 D’station Porsche 911 GT3-R of Satoshi Hoshino, Seiji Ara, and Tsubasa Kondo made a late charge to an impressive victory from pole position to win the second round of the 2018 Pirelli Super Taikyu Series at Sportsland Sugo.
Sunday’s Group 1 race, featuring the top classes in Super Taikyu (ST-X, ST-TCR, ST-1, ST-2 and ST3), was the second of two three-hour races held that weekend around the tricky 3.7 km bullring, and 2004 Le Mans champion Ara led the way in the first half-hour of the race.
Things quickly changed when the Full Course Yellow (FCY) was brought out, when Jeffrey Lee spun the #81 J-Fly Racing Audi R8 LMS into the gravel at Turn 2. Reacting quickly, D’station Racing brought in the Porsche to top off their fuel tank, leaving Ara in.
Also during the FCY, the #82 Phoenix Racing Asia Audi R8 made their stop. Alex Yoong needed only 13 laps in the car, as he turned the controls over to Shawn Thong for the middle leg of the race. Ara would stay in the lead through the first hour, but the cost-free pit stop for the #82 Audi would put them at the front.
It would also give their young pro Thong a chance to put serious distance over the field as gentleman driver Satoshi Hoshino went into the D’station Porsche on lap 47. Thong pitted the #82 Audi from the lead on Lap 70, handing the car over to Alex Au, their gentleman driver. Four laps later, the #777 Porsche came in, and Tsubasa Kondo took over for the final 50 laps. By the time the second pit stop cycle closed, Au had a comfortable lead of over 50 seconds over Kondo.
But Kondo went on a tear in the final leg of the race, clocking in consistent lap times in the 1 minute 22 second range as Au could manage to only get into the 1’24-1’25 range ahead of him. With half an hour to go, Kondo had taken a 50 second deficit down to less than 10 seconds, and it seemed as if it was just a matter of time before the lead was overhauled.
Sure as the sun was setting over the wooded hills of Miyagi Prefecture, on lap 105, the Porsche got into the slipstream of the Audi, and Kondo made his move at the bottom of the hill at Horseback Corner to take the lead of the race, a lead that Kondo would put well out of reach in the final half-hour en route to D’station Racing’s first win of the 2018 season, completing 124 laps in 3 hours.
Kondo (above, left) put it well out of reach for the rest of their ST-X class rivals, winning by a final margin of 40 seconds – a whopping margin amassed in just the final half-hour of the race.
This is D’station Racing’s second win in the last three Super Taikyu races, their last win coming in the 2017 finale at Okayama. It also gives the team a massive boost of momentum going into the Fuji Super TEC 24 Hours on June 2-3.
Au still held on to second place to take Phoenix Racing Asia’s very first Super Taikyu podium finish, as well as the first podium for the Audi R8 LMS GT3. The #82 Audi of Au, Yoong, and Thong finished ahead of the #24 ThreeBond Nissan Gakuen GT-R (Yuudai Uchida/Tomonobu Fujii/Kazuki Hiramine), who held onto third place even after a late drive-through penalty for a pit work infraction.
The other two Nissan GT-Rs completed the top 5, with the #3 Endless GT-R (Yuke Taniguchi/Hideki Yamauchi/Tsubasa Mekaru) fourth, and the #99 Y’s Distraction GTNET GT-R (Teruhiko Hamano/Kazuki Hoshino/Kiyoto Fujinami) fifth, their race compromised by an early drive-through penalty for overtaking under yellows.
8th overall and winners in the ST-1 class were the #31 Nissoku Porsche 911 GT3 Cup of Katsuhito “Jack” Ogawa, Masami Kageyama, and Ryuichiro Tomita, who won the class by two laps. This is expected to be their last race in ST-1 before moving up to ST-X starting at Fuji.
ST-TCR was not short of drama throughout the race, and in the end, it was the #97 Modulo Honda Civic TCR of Tadao Uematsu, Shinji Nakano, and Hiroki Otsu who came away the winners for the second consecutive race.
Halfway through the race, two opportune pit stops under the FCY put the #19 BRP Audi Mie RS3 (Hirobon/Takeshi Matsumoto) and the #10 Racingline Performance Volkswagen Golf TCR (Philippe Devesa/Shogo Mitsuyama) into contention. But the Golf retired after 66 laps with a transmission failure, taking them out of contention.
Otsu came into the race on lap 79, and held a slim margin over Matsumoto – but the young Honda protege wouldn’t be denied a victory, as he held off and eventually extended the Modulo Civic’s lead over the BRP Audi to take their second win of the 2018 season – and back-to-back Sugo ST-TCR wins for the #97 crew.
A big surprise and a good one – in third place upon debut, the new #65 L&JR Mars Audi RS3 LMS of Daisuke Imamura, Masanobu Kato, and Hiroki Kokuzawa rounded off the podium.
Manabu Osawa, Hitoshi Goto, and Takuto Iguchi scored the second ST-2 class win of the season for the #59 DAMD Motul Subaru WRX STI. The #6 Shinryo Auto/Dixcel Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X (Tomohiro Tomimasu/Yasushi Kikuchi/Masazumi Ohashi) looked as if it would bring an end to the Subaru’s grip on the class, but overheating issues forced them to retire in the final half-hour.
Despite being well off the pace of their ST-2 peers, the #17 Team Nopro Mazda Axela Sky-D (Tatsuya Tanigawa/Tatsuya Nogami/Toshihiko Nogami) survived the race distance to finish 2nd in class, a great result for the diesel-powered Mazda.
The Nissan Fairlady Z34 continued to demonstrate its muscle at Sugo, as the #15 Okabe Jidosha Motorsport Z of Masaaki Nagashima, Kazuomi Komatsu, and Yuya Sakamoto won out in a competitive ST-3 class.
By pitting one lap before the FCY to switch from Nagashima to Sakamoto, the #15 Nissan eventually worked its way past the #62 Denso Le Beausset Lexus RC350 (Koki Saga/Kenta Yamashita/Ritomo Miyata), which looked to be the car to beat. Instead, they fell to third at the end, behind the #38 Advics Lexus IS 350 (Makoto Hotta/Ryohei Sakaguchi), within the last half-hour of the race.
While Yamashita’s role in the #62 Lexus was diminished due to the early FCY, his GT500 counterpart Katsumasa Chiyo did 50 laps in the #9 MP Racing Nissan Fairlady Z33 – but despite Chiyo’s best efforts, he and Joe Shindo still finished only 8th in class, 5 laps off the leaders.
The Pirelli Super Taikyu Series will reconvene on 8 May for the second and final test before the big one, the Fuji Super TEC 24 Hours, which runs on 2-3 June.
Images courtesy of the Super Taikyu Organisation (STO)
