The Honda HRC Prelude-GT scored its first win in the Autobacs SUPER GT Series this Sunday at Fuji Speedway, where the #100 Stanley Prelude-GT of Naoki Yamamoto and Tadasuke Makino won the Fuji GT 300KM Race.
Stanley Team Kunimitsu’s drivers finished only 0.662 seconds ahead of the #8 ARTA Mugen Prelude-GT of Kakunoshin Ohta and Hiroki Otsu, who completed a Honda 1-2 finish on a day that began with rain, disorder and a frightening accident for Modulo Nakajima Racing’s GT500 newcomer Igor Fraga.
Shortly after the Sunday morning warm-up, rain showers hit Fuji Speedway, only for the rain to stop with less than ten minutes to go before the start. In a haste, the GT500 teams switched to dry tyres before the race officially began under control of the Safety Car.
After four laps behind the Safety Car, polesitter Otsu led the field to the green flag, but behind him, Fraga got a bit of a slow getaway in the #64 Modulo Prelude-GT, opening the door for the #23 Motul Niterra Nissan Z NISMO GT500 of Mitsunori Takaboshi and the #12 TRS Impul with SDG Z of Bertrand Baguette to try an overtake down the main straightaway. Baguette then touched Takaboshi and sent him into Fraga, whose car spun out and blew over into the air, landing driver-side first – and narrowly missing a strike against the gantry along the frontstretch. Immediately, the race was red-flagged.
Thankfully, Fraga was conscious and suffered no life-threatening injuries, though as a precaution, he was transported to a local hospital for further examination. Along with the #64 Modulo Prelude, the #23 Motul Z retired due to suspension damage, and the #12 TRS Impul Z was later given a 90-second penalty stop for causing the incident.
The red flag was lifted after 34 minutes, and after a few pace laps behind the Safety Car, the race properly commenced on lap 10 – but before reaching the first corner, Otsu was overtaken for the lead by the #100 Stanley Prelude of Yamamoto, who drove into the lead.
Yamamoto and Makino would lead virtually the remainder of the race. Meanwhile, the #8 ARTA Mugen Prelude slipped behind the #37 Deloitte TOM’S GR Supra after pit stops, but with eight laps to go, Ohta fought his way past Giuliano Alesi to move into second place.
He then began rapidly pursuing Makino for the lead, closing the gap down to only a second by the final lap. But Makino and the #100 Stanley Civic had more than enough in hand to hang on and score a landmark first win for the new HRC Prelude-GT.
The #37 Deloitte GR Supra of Alesi and Ukyo Sasahara would complete the podium in third – but the championship leaders, the #36 au TOM’S GR Supra of Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita, drove brilliantly from 11th to finish fourth and extend their championship lead. It appeared as if the Success Refuelling Restrictor, imposed on the #36 au TOM’S GR Supra for its early brace of wins, did not have the desired effect as the #36 TOM’S crew still provided a rapid pit stop.
Tsuboi and Yamashita’s lead is now 20 points over the #14 ENEOS X Prime GR Supra (Nirei Fukuzumi/Kazuya Oshima), which finished seventh behind the #17 Astemo HRC Prelude-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi/Yuto Nomura) and the #38 KeePer Cerumo GR Supra (Toshiki Oyu/Rikuto Kobayashi). Nissan’s top finisher was the #24 Realize Corporation Z (Teppei Natori/Atsushi Miyake), out of the points in 11th.
Toyota may have been denied the GT500 win at its home track, but it would win in GT300 as the #52 Saitama Green Brave Toyota GR Supra of Hiroki Yoshida and Seita Nonaka prevailed for the team’s first win since Autopolis in October 2023.
The #52 Green Brave GR Supra was one of the last GT300 cars to make its routine pit stop, and elected to only change the front-side Bridgestone tyres. This allowed Yoshida to jump past the pole-sitting #45 PONOS Ferrari 296 GT3 (Takuro Shinohara/Shintaro Kawabata) which had controlled the race up to that point.
Kawabata fought to get past Yoshida but the Ferrari could not find a way through, and eventually, he fell into the clutches of the #7 CarGuy MKS Ferrari (Zak O’Sullivan/Kiyoshi Umegaki) and the #32 ENEOS X Prime Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO (Hiroaki Ishiura/Tokiya Suzuki).
Yoshida won by 7.881 seconds, followed by the #32 ENEOS AMG in second, and the #7 CarGuy MKS Ferrari in third. The #45 PONOS Ferrari slipped down to fourth, just half a second behind the sister 296.
The Green Brave duo’s victory propelled them to the GT300 championship lead on countback, level on points with the #2 Hyper Water INGING Toyota GR86 (Yuui Tsutsumi/Kazuhisa Urabe), two points ahead of the #56 Realize/Nissan Mechanic Challenge GT-R (João Paulo de Oliveira/Iori Kimura), three ahead of the #65 LEON Pyramid AMG (Naoya Gamou/Togo Suganami), and five ahead of the #777 D’station Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo (Tomonobu Fujii/Charlie Fagg).
The #56 Realize GT-R finished fifth, the #2 Hyper Water GR86 was seventh, and the #65 LEON Pyramid AMG was tenth. The #777 D’station Vantage finished out of the points in 23rd.
Up next is the Suzuka GT 300km Race on 23 August, the fourth race of the season – which has recently been restored back to eight races.
More to follow…
Images © GTA
