Qualifying for the 2021 Fuji Super TEC 24 Hours was cancelled Friday afternoon due to persistent rain at Fuji Speedway. The sessions were due to start at 12:00 JST (local time), beginning with the two segments of qualifying for the “A” and “B” drivers that was supposed to determine the grid order.
However, once 12:00 struck, the start of qualifying was delayed for an hour, then every thirty minutes. Finally, Super Taikyu officials made the decision at 15:10 JST to cancel the session, due to the weather and no prospect of conditions improving until after sundown.
Per Super Taikyu regulations, the grid order for the start of the race on Saturday will be determined by the current championship standings after two rounds. That means that the #777 D’station Aston Martin AMR Vantage GT3, driven by Satoshi Hoshino / Tomonobu Fujii / Tsubasa Kondo, will start from pole position.
Group 1’s grid will be led by the ST-X (GT3) class, followed by ST-1, ST-Z (GT4), ST-Q (petrol), and ST-TCR in that order. Group 2 will line up with the ST-2 class cars up front, followed by ST-3, ST-4, ST-Q (hydrogen), and ST-5 classes. Due to a crash in Night Practice on Thursday, the ST-Z class #22 Waimarama EBI Porsche Cayman MR Clubsport GT4 will start from the pit lane.
There is much better news to report with regards to the weather, however – the rain is expected to end before sunrise tomorrow, yielding to sunny skies for the start of the race at 15:00 JST – and the chance of rain over the course 24-hour race has dropped significantly!
Three practice sessions were held on Thursday, with the first session held in dry conditions until rain impacted the second daytime session and night practice. In Session 1, the #999 CarGuy Honda NSX GT3 recorded the fastest time, with Kei Cozzolino setting a best time of 1’40.686. In a wet Session 2, the #33 TSK Audi R8 LMS GT3 went fastest, with Ritomo Miyata setting a 1’48.837.
Thursday Free Practice Results: Session 1 | Session 2 | Night Practice
Images courtesy of Fuji Speedway
