It was another perfect SRO Japan Cup weekend for K-tunes Racing – who won both races at Suzuka Circuit this past weekend.
In Race 1, the #96 K-tunes Lexus RC F GT3 of Kazunori Suenaga and Morio Nitta held off the #98 Ferrari 296 GT3 of Daisuke Yamawaki and Shinichi Takagi by just eight-tenths of a second to capture its first win of the season on Saturday.
Nitta took the lead shortly after the ten-minute pit window and began cruising away from the field, but his old friend Takagi quickly moved up to second place and began cutting into a five-second deficit. Despite Takagi’s best efforts, Nitta would have enough pace to take the win alongside co-driver Suenaga.
This win ended a long drought for the Lexus RC F GT3 in SRO competition – the marque’s last victory came all the way back in 2018 at the Paul Ricard 1000km. And it happened just hours after Nissan ended its own SRO winless drought courtesy of Team 5Zigen’s Race 1 win in GT World Challenge Asia.
Yamawaki and Takagi finished second after starting ninth out of 15 cars; Yamawaki had taken provisional pole in Qualifying but had his fastest time deleted and received a five-place grid penalty for setting his best lap through a local yellow flag.
The #7 Comet Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 (Yorikatsu Tsujiko/Yusuke Yamasaki) finished third in GT3, followed by the #55 Macchina Racing McLaren 720S GT3 (Tadao Uematsu) and the #360 RunUp Sports Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 (Masaaki Nishikawa/Atsushi Tanaka).
Yamawaki’s error in qualifying gave the #9 Bingo Racing Callaway Corvette C7 GT3-R (Shinji Takei/Motoki Takami) the pole for Race 1, but the Transformers Corvette retired early on due to a transmission problem.
The two K-tunes cars of Takagi and Nitta shared the front row for Race 2 on Sunday, and the ruby red #98 Ferrari of Takagi and Yamawaki cruised to a commanding win, by 50 seconds over the #96 Lexus of Nitta and Suenaga.
Suenaga and Shinji Takei battled for second during their closing stints, but Takei collided with Suenaga heading into turn one, sending both cars spinning. Suenaga was able to recover without losing positions, but Takei dropped out of third place and was given a drive-through penalty for avoidable contact.
Worse still, because of radio communication problems, the #9 Corvette was black-flagged for failing to serve its penalty within three laps – then was disqualified for not serving its black flag in time.
Thus the #7 Comet Ferrari would finish third, less than a second away from the #96 K-tunes Lexus; the #55 Macchina McLaren of Uematsu would again finish fourth ahead of the #360 RunUp Sports Nissan.
With the Japan Cup finale at Okayama just over six weeks away, K-tunes Racing has already clinched the GT3 Teams’ Championship ahead of its home race, and the pairing of Yamawaki and Takagi can clinch the GT3 Drivers’ Championship with a podium finish in the first race on 24 August.
The #38 Wakayama Toyota with Hojust Racing GR Supra GT4 of Toshiyuki Ochiai and Takeshi Suehiro swept both races in the GT4 class, headlined by a thrilling battle for the win between Suehiro and Masaki Kano in Race 1.
Suehiro and Kano fought hard for the lead over the final 15 minutes, but the white and green #38 Toyota would hold on by just eight-tenths of a second to capture its first win of the season. Kano and Yuki Fujii finished second in the #50 Y’Z Racing BMW M4 GT4, which led its class early on but got jumped in the pit stop cycles.
Their hard fighting allowed the #39 Toyota Gazoo Racing Indonesia GR Supra (Haridarma Manoppo/Seita Nonaka) to close up on the lead fight, but Nonaka finished third, six-tenths off the top step of the podium.
Suehiro led his opening stint in Race 1 ahead of TGR-DC top prospect Nonaka, then Ochiai held off a hard-charging Yuki Fujii to take the Race 2 victory by two seconds. The finishing order in both races was the same – with the #38 Hojust GR Supra ahead of the #50 Y’Z BMW and #39 TGR-ID GR Supra.
Those two victories have given Suehiro the lead in the GT4 Drivers’ Championship, by six points over Manoppo, and seven points over Fujii & Kano.
Fourth in both races was Tatsuya Hoshino and Kenji Hama in the #47 D’station Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT4 – who elected to race in GT4 instead of GT3 this weekend.
ABSSA Motorsport borrowed a Ferrari 488 Challenge for the weekend after its usual #16 Mercedes-AMG GT4 was damaged in a testing accident. The loaned #16 Ferrari of Kiwamu Katayama and Masataka Inoue finished sixth overall in both races and won GTC ahead of the #83 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup of Makoto Haga.
Images © Shigenobu Yoshida / SRO Motorsports Group Asia
