Lexus Gazoo Racing continued their perfect start to the 2017 Autobacs Super GT Series, as the “flagship” car of the fleet, the #36 au TOM’s LC500 of Kazuki Nakajima and James Rossiter, took the victory in a thrilling Super GT in Kyushu 300km at Autopolis circuit in Oita Prefecture.
Rossiter started the race from seventh after Nakajima’s error in the second stage of qualifying. After a lengthy Safety Car period for a three-car incident at the final corner, the Brit wasted no time taking the initiative to climb up the order with some aggressive overtakes, making his way up to second place by the half-way point in the 65 lap race, after passing reigning GT500 champion Heikki Kovalainen in the #1 Denso Kobelco SARD LC500.
After a round of pit stops for fuel, tyres, and driver changes, World Endurance Drivers’ Championship leader Nakajima took over the #36 au TOM’s LC500, and Kohei Hirate took over the champions’ Denso SARD LC500. Nakajima and Hirate would run tail-to-nose for several laps.
With 15 laps to go, the battle came to a head as the two drivers went side-by-side into Turns 15 and 16 – Nakajima had the inside line on Hirate, and the two collided, sending the Denso SARD LC500 into a spin. Adding insult to injury, Hirate would get in an incident with a GT300 backmarker just a few metres further away, ending their race.
Stewards reviewed the incident, ruling that no further action would be taken. And despite some damage to the right-front of the #36 au TOM’s LC500, Nakajima had a margin of half a minute over the field – going on to take the win, Lexus’ third straight GT500 win of the season, their fourth going back to the end of 2016.
“Today was truly a day full of action,” said Rossiter. “At first, I was running behind the battle between Andrea [Caldarelli] and Nick [Cassidy] and that was the toughest part. But after the Safety Car came out, I though that the real race would be from that point on, so I pushed hard. I kept running in full-attack mode, and I really enjoyed it. We got the win, so I am satisfied.”
“After yesterday’s qualifying, I was starting to lose my confidence,” Nakajima said with a laugh, so I decided to race calmly today. But, James did a magnificent job at the wheel and got us to where we could take the lead. That was more than I ever expected.”
“I had a bad time getting through the traffic (of back markers) and it allowed the No. 1 car to catch up with me. There was nothing I could do about the ensuing collision and that was unfortunate. There was some damage to my machine, but fortunately I was somehow able to get to the finish first.”
This was Nakajima’s first Super GT victory since returning to the series this year – he’d last won in 2014 at Buriram United International Circuit in Thailand. This was also Rossiter’s sixth career win, and the first victory for first-year team director, Daisuke Ito.
Finishing second, and scoring Honda’s first GT500 podium of the season, a remarkable performance for the #17 Keihin NSX-GT of Koudai Tsukakoshi & Takashi Kogure – which was scheduled to start last, but after an electrical issue before the race, would have to take a pit-lane start!
Kogure and Tsukakoshi then charged through the field, including a brilliant three-wide pass on Lap 33, and after a lengthy battle with the #100 Raybrig NSX-GT of Naoki Yamamoto & Takuya Izawa, Tsukakoshi powered past with 13 laps to go, and drove on to take second place.
The Raybrig NSX-GT came home third, unlucky after Yamamoto had built up a nine-second lead after just 5 laps – only to see it wiped out by a Safety Car. They faded after a slow pit stop, but co-driver Izawa still held his nerve in an intense battle for third place to take Team Kunimitsu’s first podium of 2017.
No doubt a great result for Honda – buoyed by the gains from a 15 kilogram weight reduction going into the race.
All four Nissan GT-Rs scored points, led by the #46 S Road Craftsports GT-R (Satoshi Motoyama/Katsumasa Chiyo) in fourth, and the #23 Motul Autech GT-R (Tsugio Matsuda/Ronnie Quintarelli) in fifth, both cars gaining on the Raybrig NSX in the closing laps.
With a sixth place finish, the #37 KeePer TOM’s LC500 (Ryo Hirakawa/Nick Cassidy) holds onto the GT500 Championship lead, but Hirakawa and Cassidy are now just 4 points ahead of Rossiter in 2nd.
It was anything but a routine pole-to-win victory for the #25 VivaC Toyota 86 MC in GT300 – as they had to hold off the #61 Subaru BRZ R&D Sport in the final laps in a heated battle!
Takamitsu Matsui in the VivaC 86, and Takuto Iguchi in the Subaru BRZ, raced to the line, side-by-side, coming out of the final corner after 61 heated laps – and in the end, Matsui won the race for VivaC Team Tsuchiya by just 0.091 seconds – the closest margin of victory in the history of the GT300 Class!
It was a hard-fought win in the end for Matsui, for young co-driver Kenta Yamashita, and the VivaC 86 of Team Tsuchiya – who now take over the GT300 Championship lead after scoring the maximum 21 points over the weekend.
“In the first half I was hoping that Yamashita would break out and give us the race, but things didn’t go that easily,” Matsui said, with a chuckle. “Since it seemed that it had been tough going in the first half, we changed the tire choice for the second half, and after they got warmed up, things went well. Because Autopolis is said to be a track where the JAF-GT300 cars have an advantage, I’m relieved that we were able to win here.”
“When I was running laps in the 1 min. 35 sec. range I thought it was a good pace,” said Yamashita, “but the Subaru BRZ was able to stay with me and it was hard for me to build up any kind of a solid lead.”
”But in the second half of the race, Matsui did a fantastic job, and although there was some trouble along the way, we managed to get the win. The drivers and the team really worked hard and we just managed to get the win, so I am glad.” This is the 21-year-old Formula 3 champion’s first career Super GT victory.
After their nail-biting finish, Matsui and Iguchi will now be headed to Germany for the Nürburgring 24 Hours – where they’ll be co-drivers at Toyota Gazoo Racing.
And after a tough start to the 2017 season, the Subaru R&D Sport squad will be happy to take their first 15 points of the year with their second-place finish, the JAF-GT300 and Mother Chassis cars scoring a 1-2 finish for their first win against the FIA GT3 contingent.
Completing the GT300 podium was the #55 ARTA BMW M6 GT3 (Shinichi Takagi/Sean Walkinshaw), which did not change tyres on their mid-race pit stop, and held on to finish third, ahead of the #7 Studie BMW M6 GT3 (Jörg Müller/Seiji Ara), the turbocharged BMWs finishing 3-4.
The #4 Goodsmile Hatsune Miku Mercedes-AMG GT3 (Nobuteru Taniguchi/Tatsuya Kataoka) ran a quiet but productive race in fifth, and the #51 JMS LM Corsa Lexus RC F GT3 (Yuichi Nakayama/Sho Tsuboi) took advantage of another long first stint to finish sixth. They’re now third and second in the GT300 championship tables, the top three still covered by two points.
Further back in the points, longtime independents Team Mach scored their first top-ten finish since 2010, as rookie drivers Natsu Sakaguchi & Kiyoto Fujinami drove to an eighth-place finish in the #5 Mach Syaken MC86.
In total, over 28,000 spectators attended the two-day weekend of racing in Super GT’s emotional return to Kyushu island. The series now takes a two-month hiatus before returning for the traditional “Summer Series” – which begins in July at Sportsland SUGO.
Photos courtesy of GT Association and Toyota
