This past weekend, the Eneos Super Taikyu Series Supported by Bridgestone visited Okayama International Circuit for a double-header penultimate round of the 2023 season.
Zhongsheng ROOKIE Racing and the #14 Mercedes-AMG GT3 driven by Ryuta Ukai, Naoya Gamou, Hibiki Taira, and Tatsuya Kataoka won the three-hour Group 1 race and took firm control of the ST-X championship standings heading into the 12 November finale at Fuji Speedway. Meanwhile, the #52 Saitama Toyopet GreenBrave Toyota GR Supra GT4 and #97 M&K Racing Honda Civic Type R TCR clinched the ST-Z and ST-TCR championships, respectively, at the conclusion of Sunday afternoon’s race.
Despite carrying 85 kilogrammes of Success Weight, the #14 ROOKIE Racing Mercedes won the pole for the Group 1 race through the combined times of Ukai and Gamou. But it was TGR Driver Challenge prospect Taira who took the start of the Group 1 race and led the field away in the opening laps of the race.
Taira led for the first 45 minutes of the race, then handed the controls over to gentleman driver Ukai as he began his compulsory one-hour stint behind the wheel. This allowed the #23 TKRI Mercedes, driven by Yuya Motojima, to take the lead as he ran a long first stint behind the wheel from third place on the grid.
Motojima finally came in after 50 laps to hand the #23 Mercedes off to Daisuke Matsunaga. Daisuke inherited a 12-second lead over Ukai in second place.
With just over 70 minutes remaining, the #14 Mercedes made its final pit stop and Gamou took over to the end of the race. Half an hour later, the #23 Mercedes came in from the lead, and the #14 cycled to the front of the field, with Gamou holding a lead of over 30 seconds to Yuhki Nakayama in the #23.
Thanks to a perfectly executed race, Gamou took the chequered flag after 114 laps and Zhongsheng ROOKIE Racing took its third win of the season in the ST-X class, following victories at the Fuji Super TEC 24 Hours and at Autopolis.
The #23 TKRI Mercedes of Daisuke, Motojima, and Nakayama finished second, 24 seconds off the win – but keeping within striking distance of the championship thanks to its fifth podium in five races this season.
Rounding out the overall podium was the #202 KCMG Honda NSX GT3 (Paul Ip/Ho-Pin Tung/Marchy Lee) which ran second in the first hour of the race, then converted that early form into a third-place finish – KCMG’s first podium since the Fuji 24h.
The #31 apr Lexus RC F GT3 (Hiroaki Nagai/Kazuto Kotaka/Koki Saga) was fourth after serving a drive-through penalty for a pit work infraction in its final stop; they finished just ahead of the #1 HELM Motorsports Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 (Yutaka Toriba/Yuya Hiraki/Reiji Hiraki) which kept its slim hopes of a repeat championship alive in fifth place, followed by the #81 Daishin GT-R GT3 (Noboyuki Oyagi/Natsu Sakaguchi/Takayuki Aoki/Kiyoto Fujinami) in sixth, one lap down.
Team 5Zigen’s Nissan GT-R made its return to the grid for the first time since winning on debut at the season-opening race at Suzuka. But the #500 Nissan GT-R had to start from the pits when the engine wouldn’t start in a timely manner. Hirobon, Shintaro Kawabata, and Yu Kanamaru would finish 19 laps off the lead in 19th overall after a series of recurring mechanical problems.
Three ST-X teams will go to the final four-hour race at Fuji with a chance at winning the premier class title, but the overwhelming advantage rests with ROOKIE Racing, which has a 21.5-point lead in the standings. Considering that each team’s lowest-scoring round will be dropped from its final championship tally, the #14 ROOKIE Racing Mercedes still just needs to finish fifth or better in its class to win the ST-X championship in 2023 – while the #1 HELM Nissan and #23 TKRI Mercedes would need to win its class to have any chance at winning the title.
There will be no such drama in the ST-Z class, however, because the championship has already been decided: A second-place finish for the #52 Saitama Toyopet GreenBrave Toyota GR Supra GT4 of Manabu Yamazaki, Hiroki Yoshida, Naoki Hattori, and Kohta Kawaai was enough to clinch the title before the final round of the season.
Yamazaki battled with his “A Driver” counterpart, Hiro Hayashi of SHADE Racing, in the middle portion of the race, but after the final round of pit stops the #52 Toyota got out ahead of its last remaining title challenger. The #52 GreenBrave GR Supra finished 13 seconds ahead of the #885 SHADE Racing GR Supra of Hayashi, Katsuyuki Hiranaka, and Eijiro Shimizu, which finished third in its class.
This is the first ST-Z class championship for the Toyota GR Supra GT4 – now in its 2023 Evo spec – and the first Super Taikyu championship for Saitama Toyopet GreenBrave since they won the 2015 ST-4 title. Already blessed with a series championship and a Fuji 24 Hour class victory in the first year competing in ST-Z, GreenBrave can add even more championship honours next week as Yoshida and Kawaai only need one point to clinch the SUPER GT GT300 championship at Mobility Resort Motegi.
Lost in the celebrations of GreenBrave’s championship coronation, the #34 Techno First Audi R8 LMS GT4 of Masaki Kano, Riki Okusa, and Hironobu Yasuda won the ST-Z class from pole position.
Okusa took an early lead while the second-placed #20 Naniwa Densou Team Impul Nissan Z GT4 (Yuki Tanaka/Kazuki Hiramine/Kazuki Oki/Kazuki Hoshino) retired less than 20 minutes into the race with a gearbox failure. That allowed the #22 Porsche Team EBI Waimarama Cayman GT4 (Kizuna/Katsumasa Chiyo/Naoya Yamano) to move into second and briefly take the lead during the first pit cycle before it also retired in the garage due to mechanical issues.
That opened a path for the #34 Audi to take the class win by just over eight seconds over the championship-winning #52 Toyota.
Fourth in class was the #21 Audi Team Hitotsuyama R8 (Daisuke Yamawaki/Sean Walkinshaw/Ritomo Miyata), with the #19 Birth Racing Project Porsche (Kenji Suzuki/Takeshi Suehiro/Kohei Fukuda/Tatsuya Tanigawa) in fifth and the #75 Team Noah Toyota (Shingo Wada/Yoshikazu Sobu/Kazuya Oshima [Osaka Pref.]) in sixth.
The championship was also decided in ST-TCR as the #97 M&K Racing Honda Civic TCR (FL5) of Mitsuhiro Endo and Shinji Nakano won in its third straight race (third driver Yusuke Mitsui was a late scratch on the morning of the race).
M&K Racing won’t be eligible for any championship prize money because the ST-TCR class wasn’t present in enough races but, this is still the first championship in Japan for the newest Civic TCR, the sixth ST-TCR title in total for Honda and fourth in a row.
The #97 Civic finished 15th overall, three laps ahead of the #5 AI’ Racing Civic TCR FK7 (Kazuhiro Sakai/Shion Tsujimoto) in 17th.
Between them was the sole ST-Q entry in the group, the #271 Team HRC Civic Type R CNF-R (Hideki Mutoh/Takuya Izawa/Hiroki Otsu) in 16th overall.
Then in ST-1, the #2 K’s Frontier KTM X-Bow GTX (Taiyo Ida/Hiroki Katoh/Kazuho Takahashi/Hiroki Yoshimoto) outduelled the #47 D’station Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT8R (Tatsuya Hoshino/Manabu Orido/Kenji Hama/Jake Parsons) for its fourth class win in a row, and a seventh-place overall finish.
Parsons was leading Katoh with less than half an hour to go until a power steering issue left the Australian driver vulnerable to attack. Katoh overtook Parsons with 23 minutes left in the race, then the #47 Aston Martin retreated to the garage as the issue got worse. D’station Racing had to rush just to get the car back out on track to see the chequered flag, 13 laps off the class victory.
It now means that all the #2 KTM needs to do is finish the final race at Fuji in order to clinch the ST-1 championship. Likewise, the ST-2 championship-leading #13 Endless Sports Toyota GR Yaris just needs to finish the race to win its championship in class.
GROUP 1 RACE RESULTS (by class) >>
However, there are still compelling championship fights to follow in ST-3, ST-4, and ST-5 after the conclusion of the Group 2 race on Sunday morning.
From pole position, the ST-3 class #38 Tracy Sports with Delta Lexus RC 350 of Shunsuke Ozaki, Yoshiyuki Tsuruga, Toshiki Ishimori, and Takanobu Ishizuka took the win in a comprehensive victory.
The two Tracy Sports with Delta Lexus ran 1-2 early on before the #15 Okabe Jidosha Motorsport Nissan Fairlady Z34 (Masaya Kono/Masaaki Nagashima/Aruga Tomita/Seiya Motojima) moved up into second place in the first hour.
But Ozaki, Tsuruga, and Ishimori had the field covered, taking the win by just under 25 seconds. That was the #38 crew’s first win since the Fuji 24 Hours, a victory that catapulted them to the top of the championship standings.
The two Okabe Jidosha Z34s completed the podium with the #15 in second and the #16 (Hirokazu Suzuki/Toru Tanaka/Tetsuya Tanaka/Kazuomi Komatsu) in third. A fuel system issue kept the #39 Tracy Sports with Delta RC 350 (Takumi Sanada/Takashi Itoh/Mamoru Okada/Shunji Fujita) off the podium in fourth overall.
As it stands, all four of these ST-3 cars still have a chance to win the championship, with the #38 Lexus holding a ten-point lead over the #15 Nissan.
Three ST-Q cars entered this race, and the #55 Mazda Spirit Racing Mazda3 Bio Concept driven by Kazuhiro Terakawa, Kaoru Ijiri, and Yutaka Seki got its first win of the season and finished fifth place overall, one place ahead of the #61 Team SDA Engineering Subaru BRZ CNF Concept (Koichi Hirota/Hideki Yamauchi/Takuto Iguchi/Kazuhiro Ito).
Nearly a year on from its debut race and running closest to Mazda’s home in Hiroshima, the biodiesel-powered Mazda3 showcased its true speed and outdueled the carbon-neutral synthetic-fuelled Subaru to the chequered flag.
Mazda Spirit Racing’s #12 Roadster CNF Concept (Ryohei Sakaguchi/Yuui Tsutsumi/Ikuo Maeda) also had a clean race and finished 11th overall, in the middle of the ST-4 class field.
Speaking of ST-4, Tracy Sports with Delta swept every class it was eligible for as the #41 Toyota GR86 of Hirotaka Ishii, Yusuke Tomibayashi, and Dai Mizuno rolled on to its second straight win of the season, holding off the #86 TOM’S Spirit GR86 (Hisashi Yabuki/Takamitsu Matsui/Shunsuke Kohno/Sho Tsuboi) by just 1.728 seconds!
Matsui made a late charge to try and erase a 12-second deficit to Tomibayashi in the last hour of the race, but Tomibayashi had enough in hand to retain the lead and put Tracy Sports with Delta on top of the ST-4 standings.
The #3 Endless Sports GR86 (Hiroyuki Saka/Ryo Ogawa/Togo Suganami) finished third in class, followed by the #884 SHADE Racing GR86 (Masahiko Kageyama/Yuji Kunimoto/Shinnosuke Yamada/Teppei Tsuruta) in fourth.
After winning back-to-back races to start the season, a seventh-place finish in class for the #60 Team G/Motion’ GR86 (Resshu Shioya/Takao Seto) has dropped it to second in the standings, and now the #41 Tracy Sports with Delta GR86 can clinch the ST-4 championship with a podium finish at Suzuka.
And in ST-5, the #88 Murakami Motors Mazda Roadster of Hiroyuki Murakami, Ryohei Arioka, Daichi Okamoto, and Soichiro Yoshida took a close victory, its second of the season and first since Suzuka.
The championship-leading #72 Nihon Automobile College Roadster (Makoto Kanai/Tetsuya Yamano/Toshiya Nojima) finished less than five seconds behind in second place, after getting past the #50 Love Drive Roadster (Isao Ihashi/Takashi Ohi/Junko Fujii) which finished third. Mazda Roadsters locked out the top five in class.
In contrast, the #17 Team NOPRO Mazda Demio Diesel Turbo (Hideyoshi Nishizawa/Tobio Ohtani/Misaki Konishi/Toshihiko Nogami) finished seventh, by far the worst result of the season for the little diesel-powered compact car.
The #72 NATS Roadster heads into Fuji with a 12.5 lead over the #17 NOPRO Demio Diesel in the ST-5 championship standings. The #88 Murakami Motors Roadster could still win the championship, but would need all 32 points available in the last race and help in the form of trouble for the top two in order to make such an incredible comeback.
GROUP 2 RACE RESULTS (by class) >>
Live English-language coverage of the 2023 Super Taikyu Series finale at Fuji Speedway airs on Twitch.tv/MotorsportJapan on Sunday, 12 November.
Images © Super Taikyu Organisation (STO), Toyota Motor Corporation
