The fans in attendance at the Fuji Super TEC 24 Hours were treated to a fireworks show at 8:15 PM local time, and through six hours, we’re well into uncharted territory for many of the drivers in this race – night racing at Fuji Speedway. The fireworks may only just be beginning.
At the sharp end of the field, the #3 Endless Nissan GT-R (Yuke Taniguchi/Hideki Yamauchi/Tsubasa Mekaru/Kyosuke Mineo/Jukuchou Sunako/Shinnosuke Yamada) has led for most of the way, but at just past the six hour mark, it’s the #99 GTNET Y’s Distraction GT-R (Teruhiko Hamano/Kazuki Hoshino/Kiyoto Fujinami/Hironobu Yasuda/Sun Zheng) that holds a 30 second lead over their Nissan stablemates, both GT-Rs having completed 195 laps through six hours.
The #99 GT-R was able to take advantage of a Full Course Yellow just before the six hour mark of the race, pitting just before the FCY was deployed and emerging with a 30 second lead over the #3 GT-R.
They may not have the newest GT3 cars on the grid, but Endless Sports and GTNET Motor Sports have still commanded this race thanks to supreme preparation, strong driving, and most importantly, enduring little to no hardships along the journey.
The same cannot be said for their ST-X class rivals. All three Phoenix Racing Asia Audi R8s have had troubles of some point. The #82 Audi (Alex Au/Alex Yoong/Shawn Thong/Philip Ellis) was knocked out one hour into the race.
The troubles compounded, when the #81 J-Fly Racing Audi (Jeffrey Lee/André Couto/Shintaro Kawabata/Alessio Picariello) was tagged with a drive-through penalty for overtaking under yellows. And just after the two-hour mark, the #83 Audi (Keong Wee Lim/Marchy Lee/Melvin Moh/Max Hofer) was spun by the ST-TCR #19 Birth Racing Project Audi RS3 LMS, whose start was delayed nearly an hour.
The #83 Audi is third, and the #81 Audi is fourth, but they are one lap and four laps down respectively.
After the three hour mark, it seemed like the #777 D’station Porsche 911 GT3-R (Satoshi Hoshino/Seiji Ara/Tsubasa Kondo/Yuya Motojima) might be a strong contender over the night hours. But just a half-hour later, while carving through traffic at the 100R corner, Kondo was spun by the ST-3 class #38 muta racing Lexus IS350, and while trying to drive away from the spin, the car had trouble getting back to power.
So the D’station Porsche was brought into the pits, and after 30 minutes of repairs, was sent back out on track – but now 11 laps down in sixth overall. A half hour after that incident, the same Lexus IS350 tangled with the #244 Max Racing Lexus RC F GT3 (Go Max/Tetsuya Tanaka/Kimiya Sato/Takeshi Tsuchiya), which is now five laps down in fifth after six hours.
The #47 D’station Porsche 911 GT3 Cup (Tatsuya Hoshino/Manabu Orido/Kenji Hama/Kenji Kobayashi/Lee Jung Woo/Ryuchiro Tomita) is seventh overall, and the #51 Diamango Porsche Cayman GT4 (Masamitsu Ishihara/Shinya Hosokawa/Daisuke Ikeda/Atsushi Yogo/Yuya Sakamoto) is fourteenth overall.
In ST-TCR, there have been major dramas for the two Dome Racing Honda Civic TCRs. The #97 Civic (Tadao Uematsu/Shinji Nakano/Hiroki Otsu/Takashi Kobayashi/Keishi Ishikawa) lost drive just after coming out of the pits with 4h50m elapsed. They’ve since got the car going again, but now they’re three laps down in third. The #98 Civic (Taiyou Iida/Hiroki Katoh/Hiroshi Hamaguchi/Kazuho Takahashi/Richard Wee) wasn’t as lucky, as they ground to a halt at Dunlop Corner at the 5h30m mark, which forced a Full Course Yellow, then a Safety Car.
The #10 Racingline Performance Volkswagen Golf TCR (Philippe Devesa/Shogo Mitsuyama/Mitsuhiro Endo/Juichi Wakisaka) thus assumes the lead of the class, running 8th overall, and the #65 L&JR Mars Audi RS3 (Daisuke Imamura/Masanobu Kato/Hiroki Kokuzawa/Toshihiro Yoshida) runs second, having lost a little bit of ground due to a drive-through penalty for a pit work violation.
The #62 Denso Le Beausset Lexus RC 350 (Koki Saga/Kenta Yamashita/Ritomo Miyata/Hiroaki Ishiura/Kohei Hirate) leads the ST-3 class and runs 12th overall, having been locked in a dogfight with the #68 Saitama Toyopet GreenBrave Toyota Mark X (Naoki Hattori/Shigekazu Wakisaka/Takayuki Hiranuma/Taku Bamba/Togo Suganami) for most of the race.
The ST-4 class had been controlled by the #86 TOM’s Spirit Toyota 86 (Takamitsu Matsui/Sho Tsuboi/Yuichi Nakayama/Naoya Gamou). But, when they went to the garage under the FCY/Safety Car period, they relinquished the class lead.
Crucially, however, they stay on the same lap as the leading #55 SunOasis Toyota 86 (Jun Tashiro/Takashi Ito/Masayuki Tanaka/Takashi Oi/Yuichi Mikasa), with the #27 D’station Toyota 86 (Isao Ihashi/Ryuju Fujita/Hideki Hirota/Masaki Baba) second, and the #884 Hayashi Telempu Toyota 86 (Katsuyuki Hiranaka/Hiro Hayashi/Hiroki Yoshida/Yuji Kunimoto) third.
ST-2 is led by the #6 Shinryo Auto/Dixcel Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X (Tomohiro Tomimasu/Yasushi Kikuchi/Masazumi Ohashi/Masato Narisawa/Yoshiki Fujii/Setsuo Furuyama). Second is the #17 DXL Aragosta Mazda Axela Diesel Turbo (Tatsuya Tanigawa/Tatsuya Nogami/Toshihiko Nogami/Hiroki Yamada/Yoshinari Fujiwara), which is doing a fantastic job of keeping up with the much faster Lancer. And the #59 DAMD Motul Subaru WRX STI (Manabu Osawa/Hitoshi Gotoh/Takuto Iguchi/Mizuki Ishizaka) is seven laps down with their new driver-side door, but lapping 2-3 seconds faster than the rest of the class.
And in ST-5, the #69 J’s Racing Honda Fit (Junichi Umemoto/Masaharu Imuta/Ifwat Razak/Tomomitsu Senoo/Hideo Kubota/Hirokazu Takahashi) is locked in a dogfight with the #88 Murakami Motors Mazda Roadster ND (Hiroyuki Murakami/Keiji Amemiya/Souichiro Yoshida/Takeshi Wakitani/Kuninori Nakane/Haruhiko Sugino) for the top spot in the class.
Not far out of reach of the ST-5 class lead is the #50 Love Drive Racing Roadster (Marie Iwaoka/Hiroko Komatsu/Anna Inotsume/Sayaka Kano/Megumi Tsujita/Yumiko Sekizaki), the all-women’s team looking to score a landmark class win if they can go the distance.
