SUPER GT Suzuka Grand Final, Entry List & Championship Preview

The 30th anniversary season of the Autobacs SUPER GT Series is heading for its unexpected December decider. The entry list for this week’s Suzuka GT 300km Grand Final features all 42 cars, taking part in the 2024 season finale.

This event was meant to take place on 1 September – the event is officially recognised as “Round 5” of the eight-round calendar in honour of its original date. But as we know, the event was postponed to December as the powerful and deadly Typhoon Shanshan made landfall in Japan, making this the first Suzuka SUPER GT finale since 2005.

That year, Yuji Tachikawa and Toranosuke Takagi of Toyota Team Cerumo won a rain-shortened Suzuka 300km and overcame a massive 14-point deficit in the final race of the season to win the title.

It also recalls the finish to the 1989 All-Japan Sports Prototype Championship. A typhoon postponed the Suzuka 1000km from August to December. Toyota Team TOM’S was the odds-on favourite to win the championship going into that final race, but Kunimitsu Takahashi’s record-breaking fourth Suzuka 1000km overall win propelled him to his fourth JSPC title.

And 35 years later, it’s TOM’S versus (Team) Kunimitsu for the most coveted championship in Japanese sports car racing, in a postponed Suzuka season finale in early December.

The #36 au TOM’S Toyota GR Supra of Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita won the penultimate race at Mobility Resort Motegi in dominating fashion, taking an 18-point lead into Suzuka – where all the Success Weight has come off the cars in GT500.

It has Tsuboi on the doorstep of history: Not only would he become the sixth man to win both the SUPER GT GT500 and Super Formula Championships in the same season – following in his former co-driver Ritomo Miyata’s footsteps – but he’d win his third GT500 Drivers’ Championship in four years, and at 29 he would be the youngest ever to enter the three-time champions’ club. Yamashita, who once had world championship aspirations of his own, would win his second GT500 title.

Without even factoring in qualifying, all the #36 au TOM’S GR Supra needs is a sixth-place finish at Suzuka to clinch the GT500 Championship. But there is a scenario where if Tsuboi and Yamashita qualify on the front row, and at least two places ahead of the #100 Stanley Honda Civic Type R-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Tadasuke Makino), they’d clinch the championship before Sunday’s 52-lap race.

That brings us to the duo of Yamamoto and Makino, for Stanley Team Kunimitsu. Only a win in the final race of the season would be enough for them to pull off the greatest championship comeback in SUPER GT history and give the new Civic Type R-GT the championship on debut. Even a pole-to-win victory would still require the #36 Toyota to finish seventh or lower.

But if anyone knows how even the most unlikely comebacks are possible on the final day, it would be Team Kunimitsu, Yamamoto, and Makino. Three years ago at Fuji, Yamamoto was cruising to his third title in four years until he was hit by a GT300 Honda NSX and forced to retire. Tsuboi and Yuhi Sekiguchi won the GT500 Championship for TOM’S after entering the weekend down by 16 points, the largest deficit ever overcome to win either of the SUPER GT Championships.

Fans of both teams will remember what happened 12 months before that, when the TOM’S Toyota of Ryo Hirakawa ran out of fuel coming out of the final corner, and Team Kunimitsu’s Yamamoto and Makino took the championship in the last 800 metres of the season.

Two other teams are still mathematically alive going into next weekend’s race, but both the #38 KeePer Cerumo GR Supra (Hiroaki Ishiura/Toshiki Oyu) and the #37 Deloitte TOM’S GR Supra (Ukyo Sasahara/Giuliano Alesi) need to win from the pole and collect all 23 points available just to have a chance. Barring some unthinkable misfortune for the #36 crew, it is almost certain that both Toyota teams are resigned to playing a supporting role – particularly the #37 Deloitte TOM’S team, the winners of the Suzuka 3 Hour Race earlier this year.

Nissan cannot fight for the GT500 Championship this year, but they’ll be in the spotlight as SUPER GT prepares to bid farewell to four-time GT500 Drivers’ Champion Ronnie Quintarelli, who announced that the Suzuka Grand Final will be his final race in the series after 20 years. Can Quintarelli and Katsumasa Chiyo drive the #23 Motul Autech Nissan Z NISMO GT500 to a fairytale finish?

It’s also the final race for the #12 Marelli Impul Z (Kazuki Hiramine/Bertrand Baguette) with Marelli or its precursor companies as its sponsor, the end of a 43-year sponsorship agreement which predates the inaugural 1994 All-Japan GT Championship season.

Over in GT300, the #65 LEON Pyramid Mercedes-AMG GT3 of Naoya Gamou and Takuro Shinohara heads into Suzuka with an 11-point advantage, on the strength of back-to-back wins at Fuji and Sugo in the summer. In 2018, Gamou and Haruki Kurosawa (now K2 R&D LEON Racing’s Team Director and nominal Reserve Driver) drove the LEON Pyramid AMG to a championship – overturning a 12-point gap to do so – and on the strength of the Bridgestone tyres, Gamou and Shinohara are in firm control of their destiny in 2024.

But after winning the last two rounds at Autopolis and Motegi, the in-form team is the #88 Venteny Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO2 of Takashi Kogure and Yuya Motojima, run by JLOC – the only GT300 team that’s been in SUPER GT/JGTC every year since the ’94 season. Isao Noritake’s JLOC team has never been this close to a championship before, and they could get there with at least a podium finish – or even better, a fourth win of the season, which would be the first time any team and drivers have won four or more races in a season since 1998!

However, LEON Racing only needs to finish second to clinch the title.

Pushed to the outskirts of title contention is the #2 muta Racing Toyota GR86 (Yuui Tsutsumi/Hibiki Taira) which is now 20 points behind – unfathomable given their early-season form, but it’s true that they now need a win to remain in contention for a championship that’s seemingly slipped from their grasp after Motegi.

While this is a 300-kilometre sprint, GT300 teams will be allowed to enter up to three drivers to a car – as they would have if the original 350km race was held in September. Along with some of the regular third drivers, this has given two fresh faces a chance to impress in a new team environment (if their teams wish to run them).

Reimei Ito is signed up to drive the #60 Syntium LM corsa Toyota GR Supra alongside Hiroki Yoshimoto and Shunsuke Kohno. Ito, who drove for Yogibo Racing last season, was just one win away from a perfect season en route to the Porsche Carrera Cup Japan championship this year. He’s driven for LM corsa before in Formula 4 and most recently in Super Formula Lights.

New to SUPER GT is 23-year-old Kazuki Oki, driving the #11 Gainer Tanax Nissan Fairlady Z in his first entry. Oki has been on Nissan’s radar for some time as a driver of Team Impul’s Nissan Z NISMO GT4 in the Super Taikyu Series, and has three Formula Regional Japanese Championship wins to his name.

It’s a can’t-miss finale to the 2024 season; a critical Qualifying session begins Saturday at 1:50 PM JST / 4:50 AM GMT, and the Suzuka GT 300km Race begins Sunday at 12:40 PM JST / 3:40 AM GMT.

Images © GTA