UPDATE – 40 Entries For Super GT Okayama Pre-Season Test

Official pre-season testing for the 2022 Autobacs Super GT Series begins in just two weeks time at Okayama International Circuit. 42 cars are on the official entry list for the Okayama test, which runs from 12-13 March.

All 15 GT500 teams will be in action together, and for the first time since 2019, no driver will be forced to miss days of pre-season testing due to travel restrictions. It will be the first time that the public can see the new Nissan Z GT500 test in person, alongside the revised Honda NSX-GT ‘Type S’ and updated Toyota GR Supra GT500.

In the GT300 class, 27 of the 28 announced entries will participate. The lone absence is muta Racing INGING, who will skip the Okayama test. Their new Toyota GR86 GT300 is expected to be at the second pre-season test at Fuji Speedway.

Also absent from the entry list is BMW works driver, Augusto Farfus, who is announced as one of BMW Team Studie x CSL’s two full-season drivers. Farfus will be relieved by third driver Tsubasa Kondo, who will share testing duties in the new BMW M4 GT3 with ace driver Seiji Ara.

With today’s announcement of Pacific CarGuy Racing’s lineup of Takeshi Kimura and Kei Cozzolino, the GT300 grid is nearing closer to completion for the 2022 season.

Team Mach will use the test as a “driver audition” for the 2022 season, according to a Facebook post from team president Tetsuji Tamanaka. Their long-serving Dome MC86 (Toyota 86 MC) will be testing with three rookie candidates, all of whom race in the Super Taikyu Series.

Two of the drivers, Yusuke Tomibayashi and Kazuya Oshima, are the two-time and reigning ST-3 class champions with Tracy Sports.

Tomibayashi, 25, aims to succeed Super GT alums Lucas Ordoñez and Jann Mardenborough in making the transition from eSports to full-carbon Super GT racing. This winter, he participated in the Virtual Le Mans Series as a sim driver, competing for D’station Racing. He was the champion of the 2016 FIA-certified Gran Turismo Championship, a prologue event to the world tour that launched in 2018.

Not to be confused with the 34-year-old Toyota factory driver of the same given name – Oshima, 24, has a background in Super FJ and one-make racing, winning the TGR Yaris Cup West Japan Series in 2021.

Also taking part in the Team Mach “audition” is Masaya Kono, 41, a regular with Okabe Jidosha Motorsports in ST-3 – and a member of the inaugural Nissan Driver Development Programme (NDDP) class of 2006.

Elsewhere on the entry list, NILZZ Racing have announced Yuki Tanaka as their second driver for the test. It is all but certain that NILZZ Racing will retain their all-am lineup of Tanaka and Taiyo Iida in 2022.

Rookie driver Yusuke Shiotsu (Gainer #10) and Ryosei Yamashita (Arnage Racing) are registered as third drivers for their respective teams. So too is Hoppy Team Tsuchiya president Takeshi Tsuchiya, who is set to get behind the wheel of his team’s new Toyota GR Supra GT300.

UPDATE (10 March) – Max Racing have withdrawn from both pre-season tests after the death of team owner Tsuyoshi Oono, and Hoppy Team Tsuchiya have also withdrawn from the Okayama test. Nobuteru Taniguchi of Goodsmile Racing & Team UKYO will not take part due to an undisclosed health issue.

Images courtesy of the GT Association (GTA)