Just three and a half weeks after Mitsunori Takaboshi crashed out spectacularly at Fuji Speedway and was sent to hospital, he and Katsumasa Chiyo drove a rebuilt #3 CraftSports Motul Nissan Z to its maiden SUPER GT premier class victory at the Suzuka GT 300km Race on Sunday.
It was the first of two trips that the Autobacs SUPER GT Series will make to the legendary figure-of-eight circuit, which celebrates its 60th anniversary in 2022. A crowd of over 21,000 spectators (32,000 over two days) made the pilgrimage to Suzuka on a warm, late spring day: Ambient temperatures around 30°C, track temperatures of 50°C, hardly a cloud in the sky. A beautiful atmosphere for an event that rightfully takes its place within motor racing’s biggest weekend.
For the second race in a row, the #19 WedsSport Advan Toyota GR Supra of Yuji Kunimoto led the field to the green flag, after a record-setting pole run on Saturday. But just like the race at Fuji, that lead would not last beyond the final sector of the opening lap. Chiyo, who started from third on the grid, had already overtaken the #37 KeePer TOM’s GR Supra of Sacha Fenestraz at turn one to slide into second position. He got a great exit out of Spoon Curve, tucked into the slipstream of Kunimoto, then took the lead through 130R Corner. Fenestraz would then outbrake Kunimoto into the ‘Triangle’ chicane to take second, as Chiyo led the opening lap in a car that had been completely rebuilt using what few spares were on hand, including the monocoque of the NISMO R&D test car.
The #12 Calsonic Impul Z (Kazuki Hiramine/Bertrand Baguette) lost a chance at valuable points when it lost an engine on lap 2. The car came to a halt in the run-off at Gyaku Bank Curve, resulting in a brief Full Course Yellow. Chiyo resumed with the lead ahead of Fenestraz, followed by the #17 Astemo Honda NSX-GT of Nobuharu Matsushita, which had gained two positions before the FCY, in the hands of the driver that won last month’s Super Formula race at Suzuka in the rain.
Further back in the pack, championship leader Kenta Yamashita was making some great moves for position. Despite the 46 kilos of Success Weight aboard the #14 Eneos X Prime GR Supra, he made a fantastic overtake through traffic to get past the #39 Denso Kobelco SARD GR Supra for sixth place.
Chiyo stretched his lead out to over three seconds, but on Lap 11, two separate incidents brought out the first Safety Car of the race. One of those was the #38 ZENT Cerumo GR Supra (Yuji Tachikawa/Hiroaki Ishiura) losing its second engine of the weekend. Tachikawa parked his smoking Toyota in the S-Curves. The race resumed from lap 15, just before the race reached one-third distance.
The #37 KeePer Supra pitted first at the end of lap 19, as TOM’s hoped to undercut the leading CraftSports Z. One lap later, the #17 Astemo NSX made its routine pit stop. Quick work from the Real Racing crew helped send Koudai Tsukakoshi out with a three second lead to Ritomo Miyata, who had taken over their respective cars. And after 21 laps, the #3 CraftSports Z made its pit stop, with Takaboshi boarding for the final stint of the race. An extraordinarily quick 30 second pit stop not only preserved, but stretched their net lead to over 16 seconds ahead of the #17 Astemo NSX!
Only one car had yet to make its pit stop, the #39 Denso Supra of Sekiguchi. He came in at the end of lap 27, just before a second Full Course Yellow was called to pick up debris from a puncture suffered by a GT300 vehicle. For the second straight race, a well-timed pit stop had put TGR Team SARD in contention for a surprise podium finish, with Yuichi Nakayama due to take the restart in second. But with his fresh tyres not yet up to temperature, he was quickly overtaken by Tsukakoshi and Miyata and dropped to fourth.
Takaboshi, meanwhile, had stretched his advantage to an unassailable 20 second margin, showing no signs of any lingering effects from his high-speed crash at Fuji.
The #16 Red Bull Motul Mugen NSX-GT (Ukyo Sasahara/Toshiki Oyu), which had been running in the top six all day, had to make two unscheduled stops which dropped them out of contention. After the second pit stop to diagnose a vibration, Oyu, on cold tyres, approached the back of the GT300 class #244 Hachi-Ichi GR Supra of Atsushi Miyake too quickly, and struck the Supra on the approach to the Hairpin. Both cars were out of the race, and a second Safety Car was declared, erasing all of Takaboshi’s advantage up front.
The race resumed from lap 44, and Takaboshi got a perfect restart to break away from the likes of Tsukakoshi, Miyata, and Nakayama behind him. By the end of the lap he’d already built a three-second lead, and on the final lap, Takaboshi was five seconds clear of the pack. He cruised with ease to the chequered flag after 52 laps, securing the first GT500 victory for the new Nissan Fairlady Z race car in just its third race.
It was also the first GT500 win for both drivers. And certainly, it’s been a long time coming for Chiyo, the 35-year-old NDDP graduate, the young man who had already won in GT300, a championship in GT World Challenge Europe, and his signature win in the 2015 Bathurst 12 Hours, but it took him six years to finally stand on the top of a GT500 podium.
“In the previous round we suffered a big crash that might have threatened Takaboshi-san’s career as a racer. The machine was badly damaged, but the team worked hard in the limited time to rebuild it for us. From the start I pushed hard with a determination that we would win this race for sure,” Chiyo said.
“Takaboshi-san had been going through rehabilitation, and due to the difficult timing of this race at Suzuka, he had little running time on the track in preparation, so I wanted to give him as much of a lead as possible. But the machine and the tires were just amazingly good. So, I just wanted to live up to the expectations of Takaboshi-san and the team and win this race.”
This was also the first GT500 victory for 29-year-old Takaboshi, another NDDP graduate who’s had success in Japan and overseas prior to his GT500 step-up. After escaping serious injury, he put together a flawless drive despite having a massive lead ripped away from him.
“Since Chiyo-san came back from the first stint with the lead for us, I felt a lot of pressure, as I had yesterday,” Takaboshi said. “I the warm-up before the race, there was a Red Flag that kept me from being able to drive, so I wasn’t able to prepare for a long run. But when I saw Chiyo-san’s times, I thought we could do well today. Our pit work was also very fast, so I was able to get out there with about a 20-second lead.”
“But then there was a Safety Car intervention. I thought we were running a bad streak of luck. But after the restart, the Michelin tyres were so good that I was able to pull away from the competition and run on to the win. I am happy to get this first win, but even more than that I was feeling sorry for the concerns I caused the team in the last round. So I am really happy about this result.”
This was NDDP Racing’s first win since the 2019 Sugo race, and the first since they became fully operated by NISMO this off-season. For Nissan, this is their fourth consecutive GT500 victory at Suzuka Circuit.
The battle for the final podium positions was nearly impacted in the final corner of the race, when Tsukakoshi, Miyata, and Nakayama approached a pack of GT300 traffic exiting the ‘Triangle’. But Tsukakoshi made it through the cluster to finish second in the #17 Astemo NSX.
In doing so, Tsukakoshi and Matsushita vanquished Real Racing’s long-standing Suzuka ‘curse’, giving them their first-ever podium at the circuit after 15 years of brutal mishaps in the 300km and 1000km races!
Miyata held on to finish third, giving he and Fenestraz their first podium and first points as co-drivers of the #37 KeePer TOM’s Supra. And, for the third time in three races, all three manufacturers were represented on the GT500 podium.
With Tsukakoshi and Miyata being held up by GT300 cars on the inside, Nakayama tried to sweep around the outside to steal a podium place – but he finished just 0.048 seconds behind Miyata, leaving he and Sekiguchi to finish fourth in the #39 Denso Supra.
The #19 WedsSport Supra of Kunimoto and Sena Sakaguchi would arrest their early tumble down the order, and consolidated a fifth-place finish, their best result of the year. They finished ahead of their Yokohama-clad bretheren, the #24 Realize Corporation Advan Z (Daiki Sasaki/Kohei Hirate) in sixth, who finished just 0.043s ahead of the #8 ARTA NSX-GT (Tomoki Nojiri/Nirei Fukuzumi) in seventh.
The #14 Eneos Supra of Yamashita and Kazuya Oshima came home to finish eighth, ahead of the #100 Stanley NSX-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Tadasuke Makino) in ninth, and then the #36 au TOM’s GR Supra (Sho Tsuboi/Giuliano Alesi) in tenth, salvaging points after their race was compromised even before the green flag, when Alesi overtook another car under yellows on the way to the grid, which resulted in a drive-through penalty.
The three-race Suzuka winning streak of Tsugio Matsuda and Ronnie Quintarelli came to a muted end. The #23 Motul Autech Z finished 12th, after Matsuda was given a drive-through penalty for hitting the back of a GT300 car after the second FCY, then after the race, an additional 40 second time penalty for overtaking under the FCY.
In the GT300 class, the #7 Studie BMW M4 GT3 of Seiji Ara and ‘super-sub’ Tsubasa Kondo drove a flawless race to win from pole position, giving the new M4 GT3 its first win in Japan after two retirements in its first two races.
But before the race, the GT300 field was reduced to 26 cars and the old saying that “nothing good comes of a morning warm-up session” rang true yet again. Katsuyuki Hiranaka suffered a heavy head-on crash as he exited the Degner Curves, which damaged the guardrail and, actually, delayed the race start by ten minutes. Hiranaka was thankfully uninjured. But his #20 SHADE Racing Toyota GR86 GT that was due to start 19th in the hands of rookie co-driver Eijiro Shimizu, was scratched from the lineup.
Once the race got going, Ara, the 2004 winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, got a fine start. Morio Nitta in the #96 K-Tunes Lexus RC F GT3 held second, followed by the #56 Realize/Nissan Mechanic Challenge GT-R of Kiyoto Fujinami in third. Ara pulled out to a two-second lead ahead of Nitta, who was now having to fend off Fujinami, as well as the #87 Bamboo Airways Lamborghini Huracán GT3 of Natsu Sakaguchi in fourth. Sadly, the #87 Bamboo Huracan suffered a puncture – Sakaguchi and Kosuke Matsuura would finish 16th.
The #18 UPGarage Honda NSX GT3 exited the race in spectacular fashion. Rookie Kakunoshin Ohta crashed at the ‘Triangle’ after suffering a brake failure exiting 130R. It was a small miracle that Ohta walked away, and the yellow and black Honda was still intact after hitting the sponge barriers. This incident along with the engine failure on the GT500 #38 ZENT Supra resulted in the first Safety Car. Once pit lane opened, the #52 Saitama Toyopet GreenBrave GR Supra of Kohta Kawaai came into the pits for a splash of fuel from 17th.
Ara ran until lap 20, before bringing his car to the pits for routine service and four fresh Michelin tyres. Tsubasa Kondo, Studie’s third driver who was relieving a Nürburgring-bound Augusto Farfus, took over for the final stint.
Behind him, two cars had taken a big gamble on pit strategy: The #5 Mach Syaken Air Buster MC86 of Yusuke Tomibayashi pitted on lap 16, and the #52 GreenBrave GR Supra pitted the following lap for fuel and driver changes only. This allowed the #5 Mach MC86 of Reiji Hiraki to assume net second position from sixth on the grid, and the #52 GreenBrave GR Supra, now driven by Hiroki Yoshida, to go up 14 places into net third! After the Studie M4’s pit stop, Hiraki even threatened to take the lead, but Kondo held him off and eventually began to pull away.
The #56 Realize GT-R GT3 was now fourth in the hands of João Paulo de Oliveira, while the #88 Weibo Primez Lamborghini (Takashi Kogure/Yuya Motojima) had moved up to fifth. A left-rear puncture caused by contact from the GT500 class #23 Motul Z almost knocked the #88 Weibo Huracán out of contention completely, but Kogure was able to bring the car back to the pits before a Full Course Yellow was declared for debris, and he remained in fifth place.
Behind them, the #244 Hachi-Ichi GR Supra of Kimiya Sato and Atsushi Miyake had driven a brilliant race, fighting their way up from 24th on the grid into the points, and determined to finish strong in the race that Max Racing had won last year. Their race would end in heartbreak after Miyake was hit from behind by Toshiki Oyu in the run-up to the Hairpin corner, and brought out a second Safety Car. Both drivers were okay, but everyone Max Racing couldn’t help but feel disappointed to come away with nothing on a weekend where SUPER GT held a brief memorial ceremony for the team’s late founder, Tsuyoshi “Go Max” Oono.
When the race resumed with nine laps remaining, Kondo got a perfect restart, while Yoshida overshot the entrance to the ‘Triangle’ and dropped three places, putting Hiraki up to second place and Oliveira up to third. Kondo immediately broke out to a four-second lead, while Hiraki was wondering if he could make his set of Yokohama tyres last the distance and take home second with a past GT300 and Super Formula champion shadowing him ’til the end. Also in the mix was the lapped #9 Pacific Hololive NAC Ferrari 488 GT3 (Takeshi Kimura/Kei Cozzolino), with Cozzolino outpacing them both as he tried to get one of his laps back!
With no challengers in his rear view, Kondo cruised to take the chequered flag after 49 laps of racing, the first Japanese win for the new G82-generation BMW M4 GT3 in its first year of racing. And for BMW Team Studie x CSL, this was their first win as an independent team, their last came at Autopolis in 2013, the last year of their alliance with Goodsmile Racing.
“I have had numerous wins in GT500, but this is my first in GT300, so I am very happy,” said Ara, who was part of Studie when they spun off from GSR in 2014, and again when they returned to SUPER GT in 2020 as a Pro-Am effort. “During the race, the speed of the M4 and the performance of the Michelin tyres were everything, and I am very happy to get this result in the race.”
For Kondo, it’s his second GT300 win, his first since the October 2020 race at Suzuka. The reigning Super Taikyu ST-X champion and four-time Porsche Carrera Cup Japan champion proved that, even without the talents of BMW factory ace Farfus on hand, Studie have a more than capable substitute, one who has certainly put his name forward for a full-time ride in 2023.
“The machine and the tyres that the team prepared for us were just incredible that I was able to run steadily the whole time,” said Kondo. I felt good running each and every lap. It was really great to get this win. I am so happy about it all.”
After nine gruelling laps with the Realize GT-R bearing down on him, Hiraki was able to hold on by two-tenths of a second to finish second for Team Mach. It was the first podium for both drivers: the younger Hiraki brother in his second season, and Tomibayashi, the long-time sim racer, Gran Turismo Sport champion and Virtual Le Mans Series competitor, and two-time Super Taikyu title winner in real-world motorsport, now a GT300 podium scorer in just his third race! This matches Team Mach’s best-ever SUPER GT result, which was a second-place finish at Suzuka in 2019.
Oliveira wasn’t quite able to overhaul the #5 Mach MC86 with 66 kg of ballast aboard his #56 Realize GT-R. But he and his team mate Fujinami will gladly take home the haul of points for finishing third place, which keeps them in the lead of the GT300 championship after three races.
Yoshida recovered from his miscue on the restart, and brought the #52 GreenBrave GR Supra home to a fourth place finish, ahead of the #88 Weibo Huracán in a somewhat miraculous fifth place.
The #34 Busou raffinée GT-R (Masataka Yanagida/Yuji Ide) gained 15 positions during the race to finish sixth, ahead of the #96 K-Tunes RC F of Nitta and Shinichi Takagi who came home seventh. Behind them, was an absolute mad scramble for the final points positions: The Pro-Am #30 apr GR86 GT (Hiroaki Nagai/Manabu Orido) finished an astonishing eighth place, just ahead of the #60 Syntium LM Corsa GR Supra (Hiroki Yoshimoto/Shunsuke Kohno) in ninth, and the #55 ARTA NSX GT3 (Hideki Mutoh/Iori Kimura) in tenth. The #4 Goodsmile Hatsune Miku Mercedes-AMG GT3 (Nobuteru Taniguchi/Tatsuya Kataoka) missed out on the final point by just 0.048 seconds!
Further back, the #61 Subaru BRZ R&D Sport (Takuto Iguchi/Hideki Yamauchi) finished 12th at the end of a difficult weekend for the reigning champs. The efforts of the #10 TanaX Gainer GT-R (Ryuichiro Tomita/Riki Okusa) to come from 27th on the grid into the points were thwarted when Tomita got a drive-through penalty for avoidable contact with the #50 Arnage MC86 (Ryosei Yamashita/Ryohei Sakaguchi). They finished 15th, while the sister #11 Gainer TanaX GT-R (Hironobu Yasuda/Keishi Ishikawa) retired after losing a wheel.
After three rounds, the #3 CraftSports Z of Chiyo/Takaboshi and the #14 Eneos Supra of Oshima/Yamashita are tied at the top of the GT500 Drivers’ Championship on 26 points, but Chiyo and Takaboshi hold the tiebreaker with a fifth-place finish in Okayama. Yamamoto and Makino are third (20 points), ahead of Tsukakoshi and Matsushita in fourth (18 points).
The #56 Realize GT-R of Fujinami and Oliveira leads the GT300 table by a whopping twelve points, ahead of Ara and Kondo whose 21 point performance this weekend elevates them to second in the standings, followed by three crews tied on 15 points each in third, led by Fuji winners Tomita and Okusa.
The Autobacs SUPER GT Series will now go on its early summer break, before resuming on 6-7 August with the Fuji GT 100 Lap Race at Fuji Speedway.
Images © GTA
