If you’ve followed the Autobacs SUPER GT Series closely over the last few years, then the cars, the teams, and the drivers of the GT500 class should still be familiar to you. Ultra-high-powered silhouette vehicles in the shapes of three of Japan’s most popular sports cars, teams backed by the full might of Japan’s three biggest automakers, and 30 world-class drivers.
LMH and LMDh prototypes are – understandably – all the rage in the world of sports car racing these days. But fans from around the world still have love in their heart for these GT500 machines with their buzzing, four-cylinder turbo engines, open tyre competition, and as much pure pace – if not more – than what you’ll find in the premier classes of WEC or IMSA.
And as 12 teams have unloaded their 15 cars at Okayama International Circuit to start the 2025 season – year 32 of Japan’s top level of multi-class sports car racing – the question on everyone’s mind is, “Who can possibly stop Toyota Gazoo Racing and TOM’S?”
Toyota GR Supra GT500
Of course, this preview begins with the strongest GT500 manufacturer of the previous year. Six wins in eight races matched Toyota’s single-season dominance from 2019 (with the Lexus LC500) and took the shine off Honda’s new Civic Type R-GT and Nissan’s revised Z NISMO.
The team at Toyota Customising & Development went to work not only refining the aerodynamics of the GR Supra GT500, but also pushing through the next evolution of its two-litre, four-cylinder racing engine, the RI4BG. With the aero tweaks and the improved response of the new powerplant, the GR Supra felt rejuvenated – and the results showed it, even if one team reaped most of the benefits.
Can Toyota do it again in 2025? The results from the Okayama and Fuji tests, when there was dry weather, indicated that this is still the fleet to beat. The fifth-gen Supra will cease production in the civilian automotive market soon, meaning there’s limited time for it to add to its motorsport legacy. There’s no better time to cash in than the present.
- #1 – TGR Team au TOM’S – Bridgestone – Sho Tsuboi, Kenta Yamashita
- #37 – TGR Team Deloitte TOM’S – Bridgestone – Ukyo Sasahara, Giuliano Alesi
TOM’S Racing had about as perfect a 50th anniversary as a team could have last year, and the results are reflected in the coveted number 1 plate worn by the orange and white au TOM’S GR Supra of reigning champions, Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita.
TOM’S and Tsuboi are attempting an unprecedented three-peat of GT500 titles together. Individually, Tsuboi could equal Ronnie Quintarelli’s record of four GT500 Championships (in five years). Let’s not forget that Yamashita is also going for his third title that would put him in very elite company – and both drivers are still just a few months away from their 30th birthdays. They are entering the territory of being the greatest drivers of their generation, and deservedly so, empowered by a strong team which allows them to reach their full potential.
That team had a change along the pit wall this winter. Team Director Daisuke Ito and engineer Satoshi Yoshitake are still here as the architects of this dynasty, but Yoshitake has been promoted to a supervisory ‘Chief Engineer’ role overseeing the former #36 car – more like a Technical Director – and young Data Engineer Taisei Ito has been promoted to Yoshitake’s previous position as Track Engineer.
The change has not, by any means, disrupted the process for Tsuboi and Yamashita, who led the final day of pre-season testing at Fuji Speedway – an ominous sign for the competition… But maybe not for the other half of this super team.
The black and green #37 TOM’S car of Ukyo Sasahara and Giuliano Alesi had some good fortune roll their way at last, and both drivers had their best seasons in GT500, reeling off two wins.
Michael Krumm helped Alesi gain much-needed confidence in his first year as Team Director of the #37 car, and this year Sasahara will be motivated to have another strong season alongside him. Together they ran more miles in pre-season testing than any other team and were quick in both wet and dry conditions.
TOM’S enters the 2025 SUPER GT Series as the clear front-runner to win another set of GT500 Championships, and even if it isn’t to the same degree of dominance as last year, these two cars are as close to odds-on title favourites as you’ll find in this class.
- #14 – TGR Team Eneos ROOKIE – Bridgestone – Kazuya Oshima, Nirei Fukuzumi
ROOKIE Racing had the speed to compete for more wins and podiums in 2024 than they achieved, but several small errors and some poor fortune added up to a year of unfulfilled promise.
There’s no change in drivers, but there have been two big changes in management. Toshiaki Takeda, the former Factory Manager, has now been promoted to Team Director – a role he once held when he managed Porsche GT300 customer team KTR in years past. And 23 years after winning the GT500 title with Toyota Team LeMans as the Chief Engineer, highly-regarded Takeshi Takada is back in that same role for ROOKIE Racing.
They’ll work side-by-side with 2019 GT500 Champion Kazuya Oshima, who brings his experience and technical ability, and the ultra-rapid Nirei Fukuzumi, now in his second season as a Toyota factory driver.
It’s well-documented that ROOKIE Racing has the personnel and the process in place to become the flagship team of Toyota Gazoo Racing Japan, but for them to take that mantle away from the likes of TOM’S, they have to start consistently achieving flagship team results in GT500.
- #19 – TGR Team WedsSport Bandoh – Yokohama – Yuji Kunimoto, Sena Sakaguchi
The blue and yellow WedsSport GR Supra is the first of three non-Bridgestone GT500 teams that were collectively shut out of the win column for the first time in 20 years. And for the first time since moving up to GT500, Racing Project Bandoh finished 15th and last in both championship tables, the lowest of that “block of three”.
Loyal to Yokohama Rubber since their days in GT300, the Bandoh team is hoping that the change back to the previous knockout qualifying format could at least spark a return to their old qualifying form. But for most of 2022-23, save for one day of good speed and better fortune at Suzuka, carrying that speed into race stints was always this team’s weak point, which needs to be addressed.
Yuji Kunimoto enters his 10th season as a Bandoh driver working alongside second-generation Team Principal Masataka Bandoh. Their experience has helped the likes of Tsuboi, Yamashita, and Miyata take the next steps in their GT500 careers and surely, Sena Sakaguchi would be next. He’s consistently extracted the most pace this package can deliver over the last three years.
The perennial dark horse of the Toyota camp should, in theory, benefit from more private testing time, plus a provision to allow teams whose tyre supplier hasn’t won a race to bring an extra set of dry tyres (until they finally win a race). Can Yokohama deliver tyres that will put Bandoh’s team back in the window for strong results?
- #38 – TGR Team KeePer Cerumo – Bridgestone – Hiroaki Ishiura, Toshiki Oyu
There’s no big changes at Cerumo this year, as the team seeks to win its first GT500 title since 2013, and its first race since 2019 – back when Team Director Yuji Tachikawa was this team’s ever-present ace driver of 25 seasons.
Of all the veteran drivers in SUPER GT, Hiroaki Ishiura has to be the top sentimental pick to win a championship this year. Ishiura, who turns 44 later this year, has won the GT300 title and two Super Formula Championships – but he enters his 18th GT500 season in search of his first top-class crown.
As good as Ishiura still is, Cerumo’s fortunes will surely ride with the flashy, charismatic Toshiki Oyu – whose switch from Honda to Toyota last year worked out for all parties. Oyu clicked with his new team principal and co-driver almost immediately, and as 2024 progressed he began to match his raw speed with the consistency that it takes to win championships.
Lost in the success of TOM’S two-car setup, three podiums in the final five races launched the KeePer GR Supra up to fourth in last year’s standings. And while it was only one day of testing, Oyu recorded the top time at Okayama in the one day that afforded dry-weather running – a big shot of confidence which could indicate that Cerumo will be back to its winning ways very soon.
- #39 – TGR Team SARD – Bridgestone – Yuhi Sekiguchi, Sacha Fenestraz
The familiar colours of the white and red Denso Kobelco SARD GR Supra will be worn by a new driver this year. After two bruising seasons in Formula E with Nissan, Argentine driver Sacha Fenestraz is back in SUPER GT, back with Toyota and, for the first time, driving for SARD Racing.
Replacing Yuichi Nakayama (who’s taken his sports car endeavours out west with Toyota’s blessing), Fenestraz is reunited with 2021 GT500 Champion Yuhi Sekiguchi. He’s has matured a lot over the years but Sekiguchi hasn’t lost his limitless fighting spirit behind the wheel. In the one year they raced together at TOM’S, Sekiguchi and Fenestraz racked up four podiums in 2020. And if Fenestraz can quickly re-acclimate to the downforce and grip of these GT500 cars, the potential is there for them to win races and compete for a championship.
That’s not the only reunion at SARD this year. Team Director and SUPER GT legend Juichi Wakisaka has brought back Kazuya Abe as his Chief Engineer, after five years at ROOKIE Racing. Wakisaka and Abe won the 2019 GT500 title in these same roles when they were at Team LeMans.
SARD’s prospects of success will hinge on how quickly the team coalesces around the additions of Fenestraz and Abe. The talent is certainly there, it’s simply a matter of application.
Honda Civic Type R-GT
Honda entered 2024 with a radical new design, swapping the NSX-GT for the five-door hatchback-inspired Civic Type R-GT. The shape of the new car was intriguing, though observers didn’t know what to really expect in the first year of the GT500 Civic.
It did get its first win at Fuji Speedway in the summer, but it felt as if there was more potential that hadn’t yet been unlocked. New minimum ride height rules were a challenge for Honda – as there was no sense in pushing the envelope on setups if it meant increasing the risk of a post-race disqualification. The disruptions in several races due to weather and changing regulations made it harder for the teams to find that baseline.
But the Civic still had outstanding traits – great straight-line speed and good mechanical grip, and we should see more of what the five Type R-GTs have to offer in 2025.
- #8 – ARTA – Bridgestone – Tomoki Nojiri, Nobuharu Matsushita
- #16 – ARTA – Bridgestone – Hiroki Otsu, Ren Sato
2025 is the third year of ARTA’s highly-touted technical alliance with Mugen/M-TEC and the formation of this current two-car team. Both of Aguri Suzuki’s Hondas have won races under this structure, but it’s hard to say that the ARTA-Mugen alliance has reached its full potential thus far.
ARTA’s two cars keep the same drivers and Track Engineers from last season, but this year they’ve appointed Mugen’s Tomohiko Koike to be the new Technical Director overseeing the Autobacs orange #8 and the freshly-liveried Wako’s blue #16. Koike’s reputation as a race engineer in Super Formula has been superb, reflected in strong results working with young drivers like Liam Lawson and Ayumu Iwasa.
On one side of the garage, there’s Tomoki Nojiri and Nobuharu Matsushita – who drove the Civic Type R-GT to its first win at Fuji. But the #8 team’s title hopes were destroyed by mechanical problems, mistakes, and bad luck in so many other races for the second year in a row.
More than ever, Nojiri – now in his 11th year in the #8 ARTA Honda – is motivated to finally win his first GT500 title to match his two Super Formula Championships, and the same goes for Matsushita, who hasn’t won a major championship since before he first went to Europe.
On the other side, the #16 team went from fringe title contenders in ’23 to just a single podium in ’24 – more consistent but without the peaks achieved by the sister car. It was hard to replace a driver like Fukuzumi, but Ren Sato has the talent to be a champion, and is gaining confidence each time he steps behind the wheel of this car. Hiroki Otsu’s relative experience and adaptability will only continue to benefit Sato.
ARTA’s two cars are due for a return to form and to finally start achieving all that’s possible – up to and including the team’s first GT500 Championship since the magical 2007 season.
- #17 – Astemo Real Racing – Bridgestone – Koudai Tsukakoshi, Syun Koide
At Astemo Real Racing, the one active GT500 driver who’s spent more time with one team than any other has a new co-driver for the third time in as many years.
With Kakunoshin Ohta taking his sports car talents to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, a place in the Honda GT500 camp has opened up for 25-year-old Syun Koide. The reigning Super Formula Lights champion was promoted from the Honda Formula Dream Project (HFDP) training system to full factory status after two years in GT300. In a short time, Koide has demonstrated many of Ohta’s best traits – he’s fast, he’s very adaptable, and is a quicker learner than he may even give himself credit for.
The cockpit of the Astemo Civic is his landing spot, placing him side-by-side with 18th-year GT500 veteran Koudai Tsukakoshi – a man who’s only driven for this team since his debut back in 2008. This year is another chapter in Tsukakoshi’s continued quest to win his and Real Racing’s first title. He’s still fast, technically savvy, and one of the toughest men to fight for position.
2024 was a difficult season for Katsutomo Kaneishi’s team. They got the Civic’s first pole and two podiums, but wins eluded them and luck wasn’t always on their side. How quickly Koide adapts to GT500 competition will tell us exactly where Real Racing stands in the 2025 order.
- #64 – Modulo Nakajima Racing – Dunlop – Takuya Izawa, Riki Okusa
Nakajima Racing is still the only GT500 team wearing Dunlop (Sumitomo) tyres – at times a blessing and a curse – but they did achieve the best finish of a non-Bridgestone team last season, and got a pole position at Motegi to show that there’s potential in this setup.
Like the two Yokohama teams, Dunlop does theoretically benefit from more allotted testing hours and the chance to bring extra dry sets to each round if they don’t win the first race, but the resources to make the most of those concessions are usually stretched as it is.
40-year-old Takuya Izawa returns as Nakajima’s veteran lead driver, working with the team and the tyre maker to develop a stronger package. The oldest driver in the Honda fleet still has reserves of speed – but it’s his experience that’s most valuable to the team, and to Riki Okusa, who enters his second year as a Honda factory GT500 driver and will be trying to build upon a solid start in 2024.
It’s been almost eight years since Nakajima Racing last won a SUPER GT championship round. A return to the podium should be the goal this season. Of course, if it rains, you can never count out Dunlop’s outlier strength in wet conditions…
- #100 – Stanley Team Kunimitsu – Bridgestone – Naoki Yamamoto, Tadasuke Makino
After a rock-solid season which saw them finish second in the GT500 Championship, Stanley Team Kunimitsu begins a new era as Honda Racing Corporation’s flagship GT500 team.
The white, black, and orange Stanley Civic will be operated directly by HRC out of the Sakura R&D facility, with help from top engineering firm Servus Japan. Armed with such rich support, the expectations at Team Kunimitsu are at an all-time high. They would love nothing more than to meet those expectations and win the team’s first championship since their late founder and namesake, Kunimitsu Takahashi, passed away three years ago.
2020 GT500 Champions Naoki Yamamoto and Tadasuke Makino begin their sixth season together in the #100 car. Two-time Champion Yamamoto showed that he was just as quick and effective as he was before his horror crash at Sugo in 2023, and he’ll now be focusing all his energy on SUPER GT after retiring from Super Formula in the off-season.
Makino, on the other hand, is as fit and as motivated as he’s ever been to win his second title. He’s morphed into an incredibly well-rounded driver with the pace, poise, and focus to qualify as Honda’s ace of the present day. Already, Makino has stood on the top step of the Super Formula podium this year and will want to do the same, many more times, in GT500 as well.
If any team could usurp the reigns of Toyota and TOM’S in 2025, it could very well be the #100 Team Kunimitsu Honda – which has finished third or better in the championship in four out of the last five seasons.
Nissan Z NISMO GT500
We’d be doing a disservice to not mention the recent turmoil at Nissan. Not just the rapid dissolution of its American GT4 programme (though it certainly doesn’t help) but the much bigger picture of the automaker’s future. Nissan’s struggles in recent years are well-documented in the greater automotive world, and the picture has only gotten murkier after talks of a merger with Honda broke down after just two months.
Maybe winning won’t cure all that ails Nissan and NISMO supporters at the moment, but it could at least put smiles on faces.
In another reorganisation of the GT500 programme’s leadership, Toshikazu Tanaka and Shinichi Kiga will split overseeing the sporting and technical sides of the operation respectively. And though he’s retired from driving, four-time GT500 Champion Ronnie Quintarelli will still be around as a NISMO advisor.
Meanwhile, the Z NISMO GT500 enters its second tour of duty. Like the Civic Type R-GT, the reshaped Z showed promise last year. It won a race at Fuji early in the season, but was ultimately no match for Toyota’s might as time went on. Optimising the setups and finding gains out of the latest NR4S24 engine will be the key for Nissan to get back to the front of the field consistently.
- #3 – NISMO NDDP – Bridgestone – Daiki Sasaki, Atsushi Miyake
- #23 – NISMO – Bridgestone – Katsumasa Chiyo, Mitsunori Takaboshi
Ronnie Quintarelli’s final season was disappointing by his immense standards. But make no mistake, NISMO faced a very difficult task to replace the legendary four-time GT500 Champion this off-season. With that in mind, NISMO has assembled a strong two-car team whose drivers create very intriguing storylines for the season to come.
In the flagship #23 car, Katsumasa Chiyo and Mitsunori Takaboshi, the two strongest and most well-rounded Nissan GT500 drivers in the fleet, have been reunited after spending 2024 in opposite sides of the NISMO garage.
When they were behind the wheel of the #3 NISMO NDDP car, Chiyo and Takaboshi were regular threats for wins and podiums. They also came heartbreakingly close to championships in the two years they were together. Now armed with a year of experience on Bridgestone tyres, these two superstars are hungry for their first championships in SUPER GT – particularly as, if you can believe it, Chiyo has begun the sunset of his amazing career.
Atsushi Miyake was outstanding in his first season as a GT500 driver, rewarding Nissan’s trust to give the former Honda and Toyota prospect an opportunity with a win at the Golden Week race at Fuji. He’s still in the #3 Niterra Z this year with a new co-driver.
Daiki Sasaki was a surprising choice to return to GT500 given some of the struggles in his last years and the up-and-down form of his 2024 GT300 campaign, but NISMO hopes that his GT500 experience, familiarity with Bridgestone rubber, and his one-lap pace will still be there. Second chances in GT500 are rare, and this may be Sasaki’s one and only chance to prove he still belongs at this level.
Can Chiyo and Takaboshi rekindle their old magic in the ace car? Can Sasaki be better than his best days from his first GT500 tenure? And can NISMO find the same form on Bridgestone tyres that they enjoyed during their partnership with Michelin?
If the answer to these questions is ‘yes’, then expect to see two red Nissan Zs fighting at the front every weekend like the days of old.
- #12 – Team Impul – Bridgestone – Kazuki Hiramine, Bertrand Baguette
Marelli’s 43-year sponsorship of Team Impul ended this offseason, but thanks to new title sponsor Tokyo Radiator, the familiar shade of “Calsonic Blue” is back on the #12 Impul Nissan – it just looks and feels right. But aesthetics of years past aren’t the only thing making a big comeback.
Over the winter, Team Impul and Kondo Racing traded their experienced Chief Engineers. That trade has brought Takuji Murata back to Impul for the first time since the mid-2000s – when second-generation Team Director, Kazuki Hoshino, was driving his father’s famous blue Nissan in GT500. Murata was also a champion during the following decade at Cerumo.
There’s no change to the line-up that won the GT500 Championship just three years ago: Kazuki Hiramine, the subject of one of SUPER GT’s best ‘rags to riches’ uprisings of recent memory, and Bertrand Baguette – can you believe he’s already about to begin his 12th season in Japan? They’re two drivers who embody the great Kazuyoshi Hoshino’s demands of maximum effort and maximum attack, and their chemistry is outstanding.
Impul looked impressive in the official pre-season tests. They were consistent last year and made it onto the podium twice, but qualifying struggles left them with too much work to do on Sundays again. Perhaps the fresh perspective of their new engineer will reinvigorate the team back into its championship form.
- #24 – Kondo Racing – Yokohama – Tsugio Matsuda, Teppei Natori
Kondo Racing once again pairs the oldest and most experienced GT500 driver, Tsugio Matsuda, with one of its youngest, sophomore Teppei Natori. They notched a pole position in Autopolis to the surprise of many, but as was the case with fellow Yokohama Rubber users WedsSport Bandoh, had extreme difficulty converting that into race results.
On the other side of the Impul/Kondo engineer swap, Toshiomi Oeki returns to Kondo Racing after winning titles at MOLA and Impul in his previous tenures. He’ll be tasked with helping Masahiko Kondo’s team break a winless drought in GT500 which dates back to November 2016.
Natori is seen as Nissan’s next star GT500 driver – some wondered how he didn’t already get the call to drive for a Bridgestone-clad team – but his development should only benefit from another season of working alongside Matsuda, the all-time GT500 wins leader, entering his 26th season in the premier category.
But like the rest of the “block of three” teams, they have a steep climb ahead of them if they’re to return to the top step of the podium this year.
