The 2024 Eneos Super Taikyu Series Empowered by Bridgestone began at Sportsland Sugo this past weekend. For the first time since 2013, the season began at Sportsland Sugo in Miyagi Prefecture – but unlike that 2013 round which was cancelled due to a sudden snowstorm, fans and competitors were treated to two beautiful days of endurance racing.
The Sugo Super Taikyu 4 Hours Race double-header began with the Group 2 race on Saturday, featuring GT4 cars from the ST-X class headlining a grid of 29 cars.
Qualifying was held in the morning, where Ryuichiro Otsuka and Ryuichiro Tomita won the pole for the Group 2 race in the #26 Team ZeroOne Nissan Z NISMO GT4. This weekend, a special qualifying format was used for both races: Instead of the traditional two-stage aggregate system, Q1 times set by each team’s ‘A’ Driver would be used to divide each class into two groups for Q2, in a knockout-style system. Then, the Q2 group times set by the ‘B’ driver would be used to determine the starting grid.
Tomita, the starting driver in the #26 Nissan, led the field to the green flag for the Group 2 race and immediately broke out to an early lead. He built a 15-second margin over the field by the end of the first hour of racing.
Behind him, defending series champion Hiroki Yoshida in the #52 Saitama Green Brave Toyota GR Supra GT4 was running second in the ST-Z class, and fighting to keep the #25 Team ZeroOne Nissan of Tsugio Matsuda behind him the entire way.
In the first hour of the race, the question seemed to be when, not if, the #2 K’s Frontier KTM Cars X-Bow GTX would take the overall lead. It had set the fastest time in Qualifying, but as a quirk of the one-off qualifying system, Taiyo Ida would have to start 14th, behind the 11 ST-Z cars and two ST-Q cars. Amateur driver Ida was still able to charge his way through the field to second overall, lapping faster than the pros in the GT4 cars ahead.
But the #2 KTM would have to come into the garage just before the start of the first hour, due to a fuel system problem. It was the first of several trips to the garage that the team would take. Ida, Hiroki Katoh, Kazuho Takahashi and Hiroki Yoshimoto only completed 80 laps and retired with 15 minutes remaining.
The first round of pit stops came after 90 minutes of racing. Saitama Green Brave brought Yoshida in and made the call not to change tyres in order to give Seita Nonaka better track position. Nonaka emerged with the race lead ahead of the #26 Team ZeroOne Nissan. With ‘A’ driver Ryuichiro Otsuka driving the #26 Nissan, Nonaka could build a bigger lead in the #52 Toyota over the course of his stint, even with double-stinted Bridgestone tyres.
Toyota and Nissan had a vice grip on the top five positions. But at the one-hour, 45-minute mark, Yuki Tanaka had a scary accident at the wheel of the #20 Naniwa Denso Team Impul Nissan. Tanaka crashed at 110R Corner and came to rest with the back tyres of the car on top of the sponge barriers. The Ligier European Series driver walked away from the accident, but a Safety Car was brought out to repair the barriers and clean up debris.
The green flag came out again at half-time, but more carnage broke out on the first lap after the restart. The #885 SHADE Racing Toyota of Katsuyuki Hiranaka hit the #25 Team ZeroOne Nissan of Tadao Uematsu at SP-In, setting off a chain reaction which collected the ST-Q class #55 Mazda Spirit Racing Mazda3 Bio Concept and the ST-5 class #290 AutoLabo Toyota Yaris. All four cars went to the garage for repairs, losing significant track time.
Meanwhile, race leader Nonaka built up a 25-second advantage just as Otsuka pitted from second place with 85 minutes remaining. Team ZeroOne took left-side tyres and fuel – and also changed drivers to Takuro Shinohara.
20 minutes later, Nonaka came in to hand the car off to Green Brave’s Manabu Yamazaki. Yamazaki was able to rejoin with the lead, but his advantage was down to less than five seconds and Shinohara was bearing down quickly. With 52 minutes left, the #26 Nissan passed the #52 Toyota to take the overall lead, and Team ZeroOne was seemingly assured of taking the Nissan Z NISMO GT4’s first-ever victory in any series.
Shinohara stretched his lead to over 25 seconds throughout the final stint and came across the finish line first after 155 laps of racing.
But just before the podium ceremonies, a 30-second time penalty was given to the #26 Nissan – reversing the top two positions and giving the win to the #52 Green Brave GR Supra of Yamazaki, Yoshida, Nonaka, and Naoki Hattori!
The penalty was for ‘Inadequate Transponder Switching’. Specifically: Shinohara had driven the final stint, but timing and scoring had shown Seiji Ara at the wheel throughout the final 85 minutes and the transponder had not been changed accordingly. There would have been no performance to be gained, but this operational error had cost the team – and the Nissan Z GT4 – its first victory.
Meanwhile, Saitama Green Brave scored its fifth ST-Z class win in the last eight races, dating back to the start of 2023.
Otsuka, Tomita, Shinohara, and Ara finished second in the revised standings, 4.6 seconds behind. Completing the ST-Z and overall podium in third was the #34 Techno First Audi R8 LMS GT4 (Masaki Kano/Riki Okusa/Hironobu Yasuda/Ryoma Henzan), which benefitted from a strong opening stint by ‘A’ driver Kano followed by the pace of young guns Okusa and Henzan to close it out.
The #19 BRP Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 RS (Yuki Fujii/Takeshi Suehiro/Anna Inotsuma/Kazuya Oshima [Neyagawa]) finished a solid fourth overall, while the #22 Porsche Team EBI Cayman GT4 RS (Shota Kitazono/Rintaro Kubo/Naoya Yamano/Yugo Iwasawa) finished fifth in class and sixth overall.
Fifth overall and the top car in ST-Q was the #92 GR Team Spirit Toyota GR Supra Racing Concept (Keizo Kato/Takamitsu Matsui/Shunsuke Kohno/Kenta Yamashita), a GT4-based car running in the ST-Q class.
It is running outside GT4 homologation with special components installed. The goal of this car is to make a version of the GR Supra GT4 that is easier and more stable for amateurs to drive at the limit. In its first race, it finished two laps off the overall win.
The #92 GR Supra was followed by the #21 Hitotsuyama Racing Mercedes-AMG GT4 (Daisuke Yamawaki/Sean Walkinshaw/James Pull/Shintaro Kawabata), the #555 Auto Factory Mercedes (Jun Tashiro/Shigehiro Ikemoto/Kazutaka Tokufuji/Go Nagata), and the #111 Buzz Progress Racing Mercedes (Nagayasu Miyagi/Max Salo/Sota Ogawa/Taiga Imoto) from the ST-Z class in seventh, eighth, and ninth.
Both Mazda Spirit Racing ST-Q cars finished the race: The #12 Mazda Roadster CNF Concept (Hiroshi Kawata/Yuui Tsutsumi/Ryohei Sakaguchi) completed 145 laps to finish tenth overall, just ahead of the #55 Mazda3 Bio Concept (Kazuhiro Terakawa/Yutaka Seki/Kaoru Ijiri) which completed 144 laps and finished 11th.
Murakami Motors opened the 2024 season with a commanding ST-5 class win in the #88 Mazda Roadster. Owner/driver Hiroyuki Murakami’s supporting cast of Daichi Okamoto, Soichiro Yoshida, and Shinichi Uemura was only finalised the day before the race, but this group of mostly familiar faces from the 2023 season was able to lift the team to victory.
The orange and green #88 Roadster went off-sequence from the other ST-5 leaders after Murakami drove his one-hour opening stint. Yoshida ran a short stint then brought the car in for full service and a driver change to Okamoto. When the Safety Car came out for Tanaka’s accident, the #88 car jumped to the lead.
Okamoto ran a superb 80-lap double stint and the strategy allowed him to put a full lap on the rest of the class. He only needed a splash of fuel to get through the last 20 minutes of the race and seal the victory for Murakami Motors.
The #65 Over Drive Roadster (Shuichiro Hokazono/Tatsuya Ota/Sena Kuronuma/Takuma Ikeda) led most of the first hour and was able to take second in class, followed by the #17 Team NOPRO Mazda2 Diesel Turbo (Hideyoshi Nishizawa/Tobio Ohtani/Misaki Konishi/Toshihiko Nogami) in third.
Fourth place would have gone to the #120 Mazda Spirit Racing Roadster (Junji Ueda/Tatsuya Minowa/Shohei Oda/Subaru Kumeta) – but with one corner to go, Oda came to a stop – an awful stroke of luck for them. The #76 Buzz Progress Racing Roadster (Masaki Ano/Junpei Kato/Hitoshi Sakai/Takashi Nara) inherited fourth place, ahead of the #27 Maple Hiroshima Racing Team Roadster (Haruhiko Sugino/Yuga Furutani/Noriyuki Higuchi) to complete a Mazda top-five lockout.
GROUP 2 RACE RESULTS (by class) >>
The Group 1 race would start Sunday, headlined by four GT3 cars in the ST-X class plus the ST-2, ST-3, and ST-4 production categories – 25 cars in total.
Defending ST-X champions Zhongsheng ROOKIE Racing started their title defence strong, as Ryuta Ukai and newcomer Giuliano Alesi took the pole position for the second four-hour race.
Alesi would start the race in the #1 Mercedes-AMG GT3 and held the lead going into the first corner, while Yuya Motojima slipped past Koki Saga to move the #23 TKRI Mercedes-AMG GT3 into second place. Alesi and Motojima ran tail-to-nose for much of their opening stints, but the French-Japanese driver was able to hold off his rival until the #23 Mercedes pitted and changed drivers to Yuhki Nakayama.
Just after the first hour, the Safety Car was brought out after Toru Tanaka crashed hard at the Hairpin Corner in his #16 Okabe Jidosha Nissan Fairlady Z34. Tanaka walked away from the crash. Other teams brought their cars into the pits and changed drivers, allowing Nakayama to take the overall lead once the race resumed after 90 minutes elapsed. ROOKIE Racing used this opportunity to plug in their ‘A’ driver Ryuta Ukai.
Nakayama pitted from the lead before the end of the second hour, handing the #23 car back off to Motojima. Motojima was then able to catch Ukai and pass him just as Ukai was wrapping up his one-hour required stint in the #1 – allowing Motojima to lap the entire field.
TKRI made its final pit stop with 62 minutes left, giving the final stint to ‘A’ driver Daisuke Matsunaga. Matsunaga left the pits with a slim lead – but by now, the hard-charging Naoya Gamou was in the rhythm of a double-stint aboard the #1 ROOKIE Mercedes-AMG. It took Gamou just a few corners to drive past and begin building up a big lead.
Gamou built a 50-second advantage in time for one final pit stop for fuel. He came out behind Matsunaga in the #23, but patiently reeled in the leader and retook the overall lead with 25 minutes left, unchallenged to the finish.
After 160 laps of racing, the #1 Zhongsheng ROOKIE AMG GT3 of Ukai, Alesi, Gamou, and Tatsuya Kataoka took the win, by a final margin of 44.4 seconds over the #23 TKRI AMG GT3 of Matsunaga, Motojima, and Nakayama in second.
The #31 apr Lexus RC F GT3 (Hideki Nagai/Kazuto Kotaka/Miki Koyama/Koki Saga) finished third, over 70 seconds behind the leader. Hideki Nagai was filling in for his brother Hiroaki, who was racing in Sepang that same weekend in GT World Challenge Asia.
The #81 Daishin Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 (Nobuhiro Imada/Kiyoto Fujinami/Takayuki Aoki/Noboyuki Oyagi) finished fourth overall but was unable to get back on the lead lap after being trapped at pit exit for over a lap following the Safety Car intervention.
Fifth place overall went to the ST-3 class winning #38 Tracy Sports with Delta Lexus RC 350 of Takanobu Ishizuki, Toshiki Ichimori, and Shunsuke Ozaki. The reigning series champions had an entertaining opening-stint scrap as Ozaki fended off the challenge of Shuji Maejima in the #15 Okabe Jidosha Z34.
The sister #39 Lexus (Shinya Fujita/Yuma Shoji/Takashi Ito) then took the lead during the Safety Car, but only briefly, as the #38 drove to the lead and controlled the race from there, leading a Tracy Sports with Delta 1-2 finish ahead of the #39. The #15 Okabe Jidosha Z34 (Shuji Maejima/Masaaki Nagashima/Nozomi Udaka/Seiya Motojima) finished third in class and was another car that lost significant time under the Safety Car.
ST-2 class honours and sixth overall went to the #225 KTMS Toyota GR Yaris of Kengo Ichijo, Shunji Okumoto, Rikuto Kobayashi and Jin Nakamura, which took a come-from-behind class win over the #72 Nihon Automobile College (NATS) Honda Civic Type R of Makoto Kanai, Tetsuya Yamano, and Toshiya Nojima.
The #225 KTMS GR Yaris was one of two cars that had to serve an early drive-through penalty as its handicap for the age and relative experience of its ‘A’ driver Ichijo – but he wouldn’t be a factor until later. When Shunji Okumoto served the penalty, the #95 Team Spoon Honda of Eiji Yamada took the lead to the delight of many Spoon Sports supporters!
However, Okamoto quickly caught up and passed Kanai, then Yamada, to retake the lead before the end of his stint. It set up a final-hour showdown between NATS’ Yamano and KTMS’ Ichijo, who had an eight-second deficit to chase down once they’d taken over their respective cars. Ichijo clawed back the deficit and took the lead with just 32 minutes left in the race.
That would be the winning move in ST-2, KTMS opened the season with a win against last year’s ST-5 champions in their new Honda Civic Type R. The #95 Spoon Civic of Yamada, Syun Koide, and Ken “Piston” Nishizawa finished third in class, followed by the #13 Endless GR Yaris (Masaya Hanzato/Mizuki Ishizaka/Hitoshi Okada) in fourth.
The highlights of the Group 1 race came out of ST-4, which treated fans to brilliant battles between the #41 Tracy Sports with Delta GR86 (Hirotaka Ishii/Yusuke Tomibayashi/Dai Mizuno), the #3 Endless GR86 (Hiroyuki Saka/Togo Suganami/Reimei Ito), and the #884 SHADE Racing GR86 (Masahiko Kageyama/Yuji Kunimoto/Shinnosuke Yamada). It began in the first hour as Tomibayashi and Suganami chased each other at full tilt for the first hour of the race.
In hour two, Kunimoto and SHADE Racing joined the fray, turning it into a three-car fight with ‘A’ drivers Saka and Ishii. Saka grabbed the lead from Ishii and fended off Kunimoto longer than most would have expected. Unfortunately, disaster struck the #41 crew after Mizuno went off course and suffered heavy front-end damage, resulting in a long trip to the garage.
This cleared the lane for Endless Sports’ super-sub Ito – taking the place of GTWC Asia-bound Ryo Ogawa – to drive to a comfortable class win. SHADE Racing finished second – but it wouldn’t be a Toyota GR86 podium sweep: The #66 Over Drive Mazda Roadster RF (Kyosuke Inomata/Kohei Tokumasa/Takahisa Ohno/Hirohito Ito) got up to third place on pit strategy.
And in ST-Q, ORC ROOKIE Racing’s two cars reached the chequered flag – led by an overall tenth-place finish for the #32 Toyota GR Yaris DAT Concept of Masahiro Sasaki, Hiroaki Ishiura, Yasuhiro Ogura – and Akio “Morizo” Toyoda.
The GR Yaris with its sport-tuned, eight-speed GR-DAT automatic transmission ran a trouble-free race and matched the pace of similar cars in the ST-2 class.
In addition, the retooled #28 Toyota GR86 CNF Concept (Eisuke Sasaki/Sho Tsuboi/Kazuya Oshima [Tomioka]/Daisuke Toyoda) finished 20th overall – the car now features the full-fat 1.6L GR Yaris inline-3 engine mated to a six-speed manual transmission sourced from the Lexus IS 200d. However, the #271 Team HRC Honda Civic Type R CNF-R (Hideki Mutoh/Hiroki Otsu/Tomoki Nojiri) retired due to mechanical issues halfway into the race.
GROUP 1 RACE RESULTS (by class) >>
Super Taikyu returns for an in-season test at Fuji Speedway on 8 May, leading up to the ninth annual running of the Fuji Super TEC 24 Hour Race, on 25/26 May.
Images © STO
