Days after his 23rd birthday, Sacha Fenestraz and 22-year-old team mate Ritomo Miyata scored their first ever GT500 class win in the Autobacs SUPER GT Series at Fuji Speedway. Fenestraz and Miyata drove the #37 KeePer TOM’s Toyota GR Supra to victory in the fourth round of the 2022 SUPER GT season, the Fuji GT 100 Lap Race.
The second trip to historic Fuji Speedway was also the second scheduled 450 kilometre “semi-endurance” race of the season. The Fuji 450km on Golden Week was scheduled for 100 laps, but only 62 were completed due to multiple severe accidents and red flags.
This time, the race was again shortened – to 99 laps. There was a sudden rain shower an hour before the scheduled race start. Most of the standing water had dried out once the field of 41 cars fired up their engines and began the parade and formation lap. However, out of concern for some lingering puddles of standing water in some parts of the track, race control opted to run a second formation lap, which deducted one racing lap.
Thankfully the race would be completed without any major incidents, and as the green flag flew for the “Fuji GT 99 Trial”, pole sitter Yuji Kunimoto in the #19 WedsSport Advan GR Supra led the field into TGR Corner (turn one), followed closely by Kohei Hirate in the #24 Realize Corporation Advan Nissan Z. Both Yokohama tyre-clad cars started on the front row as they did in the Golden Week race, but this time, instead of rapidly falling down the order, they were able to remain first and second at the completion of the first lap.
Soon, however, Kunimoto came under threat from the two-time GT500 champion Hirate, who made a fantastic exit out of the final corner at the end of lap two, and as the two leaders were about to begin lap three, Hirate slipstreamed past Kunimoto to take the lead for Kondo Racing. Not bad, considering that Hirate went off track during the parade lap trying to warm up his tyres, which could have ended his race before it ever began!
The new Nissan Z was a rocket in a straight line, clocking in at 302 km/h down the speed trap. Hirate’s driving demonstrated the improvements of the Yokohama Advan tyres since the end of the two-month break between rounds three and four.
Yet, the WedsSport Supra still found itself struggling for pace early on. Fenestraz overtook Kunimoto for second place just a lap after Hirate took the lead. On lap seven, Bertrand Baguette in the #12 Calsonic Z, who started seventh, overtook Kunimoto for third place. After 12 laps, Hirate built a three-second lead over Fenestraz, while Kunimoto fell to sixth place.
The window for the first of two compulsory pit stops for refuelling opened up just 20 laps into the race – but it wouldn’t be until the end of lap 36 when the second-ranked KeePer Supra pitted for its first stop, taking four fresh Bridgestone tyres and changing drivers from Fenestraz to Miyata. One lap later, the Realize Z made its first stop, and Daiki Sasaki took over to run the middle stint.
Trouble struck two of the veteran teams after the first round of pit stops. On lap 35, the #23 Motul Autech Z (Tsugio Matsuda/Ronnie Quintarelli) began slowing down in sector three, just two laps after Matsuda took over from Quintarelli in fifth place. They went to the garage to diagnose a problem with the cooling system sensor, ending their chances at scoring points. A second trip to the garage would leave them to finish ten laps down in 14th place.
The #38 ZENT Cerumo GR Supra (Yuji Tachikawa/Hiroaki Ishiura) was already up against it, having to serve a ten-second penalty stop during the race for unapproved chassis and engine change-outs since the Suzuka 300km in May. Then after Tachikawa handed the car off to Ishiura, Ishiura limped back to the pits and stopped near the entrance of pit lane on lap 42. The problem was diagnosed as an electrical system failure.
When the first round of pit stops finished, the #24 Realize Z of Sasaki held on to the lead by just over two seconds from the #37 KeePer Supra of Miyata, with the #12 Calsonic Z now third in the hands of Kazuki Hiramine.
As the second stint wound down, Hiramine began to close in on Miyata, who was still trying to close in on Sasaki. Hiramine brought the gap down to less than a second and was eager to grab second place to secure a Nissan 1-2 finish.
At the end of lap 72, the Realize Z made its second and final stop. Hirate got on board to run the closing stint of the race, and the Kondo Racing team completed their final full-service stop in 36.3 seconds.
One lap later, the KeePer Supra made its final stop, and opted to leave Miyata in for a double stint to close out the race. They completed their service in a rapid 28.7 seconds, which allowed Miyata to exit the pits with a ten-second lead over Hirate! And on the following lap, the Calsonic Z made its final pit stop. Hiramine would also do a double stint, but stalled momentarily coming out of his box, then, on cold tyres, locked up into TGR Corner and ran off course before rejoining eight seconds ahead of Hirate, who just couldn’t get his tyres switched on quickly enough on the out lap.
From there, Miyata resumed with a lead of around five seconds to second-ranked Hiramine, and all he had to do was maintain a steady rhythm over the final quarter of the race. He executed that to perfection, officially taking the lead with 19 laps to go, and holding on to take the chequered flag by seven and a half seconds.
The feeling was that it was just a matter of time before the fiery young combination of Fenestraz and Miyata, the one-time All-Japan F3 title rivals turned close friends, would go on to take their first GT500 victory together, especially after Fenestraz scored his first Super Formula Championship win at Sportsland Sugo back in June. Now their immense potential has been realized in the premier class of the SUPER GT Series.
“I’m very happy!” exclaimed Fenestraz after the race. “But this was not just my win, but a win that was achieved by everyone on the team.”
“The team really supported me all the way today, especially with their perfect performance on the second pit stop. That made it a great win both for me and the team. And I also want to thank all of the fans that supported us today.”
“We did it!” Miyata exclaimed. “The second stint that I drove was quite tough, and though things were going well at first, after that the No. 24 Z had a stronger pace. So I switched to a strategy of maintaining my pace so that we could take the lead in the next stint, and that worked very well.”
“After taking the lead, our pace was good, and I was just hoping that the race would finish soon. Sacha and I and the team had thought hard about how to get a good setup for the car, and I was so glad to see how those efforts paid off.”
If the rumours are true that the Franco-Argentine driver Fenestraz is departing Toyota and Japan at the end of the season to race for Nissan in the Formula E World Championship, then he has shown that he has what it takes to depart as a champion. One has to wonder if that first victory would have come sooner if his 2021 campaign wasn’t disrupted due to visa issues, but he has it now.
And for Miyata, it was redemption for him after a friendly fire collision with Alesi in the Golden Week race, which cost them both a chance at the victory. His first GT500 victory, the first in SUPER GT for a driver openly diagnosed on the autism spectrum, should also be celebrated as a triumph. He is demonstrating, just as he did as a Formula 4 and Super Formula Lights champion, that people like him aren’t disadvantaged – but blessed with their own unique strengths that should be accepted rather than stigmatised.
Hiramine finished in second to give the famous Calsonic Impul Z their second podium of the season, both of which have come at Fuji Speedway. Hiramine quickly regained his composure after overshooting the first corner out of the pits, and completed a strong performance that began with Baguette’s charge up the order in the opening stint.
And with the #24 Realize Z of Sasaki and Hirate finishing third, Kondo Racing scored their first podium of 2022, and Nissan finished with two cars on the podium. But it’s hard to let go of the fact that this very well could have been the team’s best chance to snap a five and a half year winless drought dating back to November 2016 at Motegi, especially after Hirate and Sasaki combined to lead 64 laps.
Even still, this was a fantastic improvement for them in a span of three months, and both Hirate and Sasaki are looking forward to another strong outing at Suzuka.
Behind them, the #36 au TOM’s GR Supra (Sho Tsuboi/Giuliano Alesi) finished in fourth place, scoring solid points on the day.
The best of the Hondas was the #8 ARTA NSX-GT (Tomoki Nojiri/Nirei Fukuzumi), which finished in fifth place in their first race since welcoming Technical Director Hitoshi Iyoki back to the ARTA pit wall as Chief Engineer for the GT500 side.
The #39 Denso Kobelco SARD GR Supra (Yuhi Sekiguchi/Yuichi Nakayama) gained six positions during the race to finish in sixth. They opted to take fuel only on their final pit stop, double-stinting their second set of tyres to gain track position.
Entering the weekend as joint-championship leaders, the #14 Eneos X Prime GR Supra (Kazuya Oshima/Kenta Yamashita) scored points in seventh, followed by the #100 Stanley NSX-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Tadasuke Makino) in eighth. The WedsSport Supra of Kunimoto and Sena Sakaguchi struggled home to a ninth place finish, while the #17 Astemo NSX-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi/Nobuharu Matsushita) recovered from starting last and a backfired strategy to double-stint their first set of tyres, as Tsukakoshi overtook the #64 Modulo NSX-GT (Takuya Izawa/Hiroki Otsu) for tenth place with two laps left.
In the GT500 Drivers’ Championship, the win from Fenestraz and Miyata brings them to the top of the table on 31 points, one point ahead of Oshima and Yamashita in second place. The #3 CraftSports Motul Z (Katsumasa Chiyo/Mitsunori Takaboshi) drops to third in points after a non-scoring 12th place finish, ahead of Hiramine and Baguette who move up into fourth. Yamamoto and Makino sit fifth in points as the highest ranked Honda tandem.
The GT300 class produced a race filled with pitfalls and heartbreaks for so many potential winners, and built to an incredible crescendo in the final laps as the #61 Subaru BRZ R&D Sport of defending series champions Takuto Iguchi and Hideki Yamauchi came from behind to take their first win of the season after a brilliant duel with the #11 Gainer TanaX Nissan GT-R GT3 of Hironobu Yasuda and Keishi Ishikawa.
It was an outcome which didn’t seem likely when the field of 26 GT300 cars took the green flag. Pole sitter Naoya Gamou broke out to an early advantage aboard the Bridgestone-clad #65 LEON Pyramid Mercedes-AMG GT3. Yamauchi was able to consolidate second place, but soon conceded that position as a hard charging Tatsuya Kataoka overtook him around Panasonic Corner (turn 16), bringing the #4 GSR Hatsune Miku AMG up into second and making it a Mercedes 1-2.
While Gamou was able to build up a ten-second advantage in just ten laps, a few teams got their first pit stops out of the way early. Very early, in fact. As early as the first lap in the case of the #5 Mach Syaken Air Buster MC86 (Yusuke Tomibayashi/Reiji Hiraki) and the #52 Saitama Toyopet GreenBrave Toyota GR Supra (Hiroki Yoshida/Kohta Kawaai). Neither would finish in the points for their efforts, but the strategic variance was on display in GT300.
It appeared that Gamou was heading into the pits for his first routine stop on lap 18, but when Gamou nearly hit the wall at the entrance of pit lane with smoke pouring out of his right front tyre, it became apparent that this wasn’t going to be a routine stop. K2 R&D LEON Racing mechanics couldn’t secure a new right front tyre on because the wheel hub had failed, and the LEON AMG of Gamou and Takuro Shinohara retired from the lead of the race, a devastating blow.
Kataoka inherited a lead of around five seconds to the Fuji 450km-winning #10 TanaX Gainer GT-R, which started in the hands of Riki Okusa, while Yamauchi dropped to third before pitting on lap 25 and turning the cockpit over to Iguchi. On the next lap, the Hatsune Miku AMG made its first stop, changing all four tyres and drivers from Kataoka to Nobuteru Taniguchi. This cycled Okusa to the lead, before he pitted at the end of lap 38.
But just as Ryuichiro Tomita was preparing to begin his stint in the #10 TanaX GT-R, the car’s starter motor broke. They went back to the garage for over twenty minutes of repairs. Tomita, Okusa, and Yusuke Shiotsu finished 14 laps down in 22nd.
The #55 ARTA Honda NSX GT3 (Hideki Mutoh/Iori Kimura) started their race from 21st, but beginning with a fantastic sequence of opening laps from the rookie Kimura and an early fuel-only stop, the ARTA NSX GT3 was running in a net third position before they suffered a catastrophic issue with their electrical system, knocking them out of contention. Kimura was able to get the car going again and bring it back to the garage. But after trying to return to the race, the car stopped again at 100R Corner, resulting in a very brief Full Course Yellow.
Taniguchi now had a lead of over 20 seconds, and it seemed that Goodsmile Racing & Team UKYO were well on their way to their first SUPER GT victory since 2017 at Okayama International Circuit. They made their second pit stop at the end of lap 61 and changed drivers back to Kataoka, who resumed with the lead of the race, with the #11 Gainer GT-R in second and the #61 Subaru BRZ in third.
But with the chequered flag just 15 laps away, disaster struck the Miku AMG when they suffered a burst left-front tyre from the race lead. After pitting for emergency service, Kataoka brought the car home in 13th place. But what a bitter defeat it was for perennial fan favourites Goodsmile Racing, who had been enjoying their best weekend in SUPER GT for some time.
This now brought the #11 Gainer GT-R, which pitted first on lap 37 then again on lap 61, up into the race lead with Yasuda at the helm for the final stint. They gained track position by short pitting on their last stop. But suffering with tyre pickup issues as the temperatures dropped late in the race, the #61 Subaru BRZ of Yamauchi was closing in rapidly. The Subaru gained some track position after their second pit stop by taking only front tyres instead of changing all four.
And the two leaders were now running tail-to-nose, battling for the lead of the race in the highlight of the closing laps. With its supreme cornering speed, the Subaru was able to close in on the Nissan through sectors two and three. But every time Yamauchi went for an overtake through Panasonic Corner, the mighty twin-turbo V6 engine of the GT-R allowed Yasuda to easily slipstream past and retake the lead, and the cycle continued for several laps.
Then, on lap 85, Yamauchi slid up the inside of Yasuda at GR Supra Corner (turn 15), and took a wider line through Panasonic Corner to draw ahead of Yasuda over the start/finish line. Yasuda wasn’t done just yet as he attempted to retake the lead down the front stretch, but Yamauchi stuck alongside him through the outside of TGR Corner, setting up the move he wanted to make by taking the inside line through Coca-Cola Corner to definitively take the lead with six laps to go.
After struggling to punch their way to the lead, the Blue Boxer drove away in the closing laps with the #61 Subaru BRZ of Iguchi and Yamauchi winning by 5.9 seconds over the line, giving the reigning champions their first win of the season.
Yamauchi, in his 100th SUPER GT race (including non-championship rounds), said after the finish: “I think it was a great race that we could enjoy, with all of the fans that have cheered us on. In the final battle, I was desperately thinking that I would do anything just to win.”
“I thought it was so cool that Yamauchi-san was able to finish his 100th SUPER GT race with a win,” said his co-driver Iguchi. “I was with him on his first race (in 2008). And Dunlop worked with us from the testing stage to develop tyres that would be good for both of us, and the tyres performed so well. So, this first win of the season wasn’t just a win by us, but by everyone.”
It was the seventh career GT500 victory for Iguchi, and the fourth for Yamauchi, who by now have made their claim to be the GT300 “golden combination” of the present day if they have not yet already done so.
A second place finish for the #11 Gainer GT-R of Yasuda and Ishikawa gives Gainer’s “senior car” their first podium of the 2022 season. They made the most of a strong double stint from Ishikawa, who gained three positions in the first ten laps, putting them in position to contend for a podium once some of the other front-runners found trouble.
Meanwhile, the #18 UPGarage NSX GT3 (Takashi Kobayashi/Kakunoshin Ohta) quietly and confidently finished in third place, giving Team UPGarage their second podium of the season. By delaying their second pit stop until lap 65, Ohta was able to emerge behind the #60 Syntium LMcorsa GR Supra (Hiroki Yoshimoto/Shunsuke Kohno) and then overtake Yoshimoto for the final podium position.
Fourth place for the #60 Syntium GR Supra is their best finish of the season, and their best since the introduction of their new customised aero package that was introduced this season.
The #96 K-Tunes Lexus RC F GT3 (Morio Nitta/Shinichi Takagi) finished fifth, for their third straight points-paying finish. And despite carrying 99 kilogrammes of Success Weight this weekend, the #56 Realize/Nissan Mechanic Challenge GT-R (Kiyoto Fujinami/João Paulo de Oliveira) ran a strong race from tenth on the grid, finishing in sixth place and scoring crucial championship points to stay on top in the GT300 Drivers’ Championship.
Seventh place yielded an incredible surprise as Pro-Am privateers Arnage Racing recorded their best finish as an independent team since 2014. The #50 Arnage MC86 (Masaki Kano/Ryohei Sakaguchi/Takeshi Suehiro) put itself in the window for points after a long first stint from Sakaguchi, and Suehiro was able to match that pace, putting their am driver Kano in position to finish in the points for the first time since the 2018 Okayama round.
The two JLOC Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evos followed, led by the #87 Bamboo Airways Huracán (Kosuke Matsuura/Natsu Sakaguchi) in eighth, ahead of the #88 Weibo Primez Huracán (Takashi Kogure/Yuya Motojima) in ninth. Motojima had to overcome a drive-through penalty which he picked up after first-lap contact with the #244 Hachi-Ichi GR Supra (Atsushi Miyake/Kimiya Sato), which took the latter out of the race. Another Pro-Am team, the #360 RunUp Rivaux GT-R (Takayuki Aoki/Atsushi Tanaka/Yusaku Shibata), finished in tenth place. They elected to run with only Aoki and Shibata for the full distance.
After four rounds, Fujinami and Oliveira now lead the GT300 standings by 8.5 points from this weekend’s winners Iguchi and Yamauchi, who leapt all the way to second place. Kobayashi/Ohta jump to third in the standings ahead of Suzuka winners Seiji Ara and Tsubasa Kondo. Ara and Augusto Farfus retired after 83 laps in the #7 Studie BMW M4 GT3, while Kondo was scratched from the weekend due to a positive COVID-19 test. Yasuda and Ishikawa complete the top five in the championship table.
The two-day weekend attendance was 47,900 spectators (29,300 for Sunday), on a weekend that looked more like the “normal” ways of SUPER GT racing than we’d seen since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, the reintroduction of the famous Circuit Safari on Saturday, was a step in that direction.
In three weeks’ time, SUPER GT returns for its second visit to Suzuka Circuit in late August. While it won’t be recognised as the 49th Suzuka Summer Endurance sports car race, the upcoming Suzuka GT 450km Race promises to be another fascinating round of action.
Images © GTA
