2020 SUPER GT Round 5 Report

【SUPER GT Round 5 / Fuji】

2020 Super GT series gets in season’s second half.
Kondo Racing scores its first win in GT300.

SUPER GT Round 5

Date 2020/10/03-04
Venue Fuji Speedway
Weather Cloudy
Surface Dry
Race Lap 66Laps
(1Lap = 4,563m)
2020 SUPER GT Round 5

The fifth round of the 2020 Super GT series was held at Fuji Speedway. Being the third race at the track this season, it also marked the first race meeting of the season’s second half, after running four rounds just in two months.

The leading competitors already had their handicap weight equal to or close to the maximum amount after the fourth round. Therefore, it was almost inevitable that they would have a hard time in this race, and many thought there might be more opportunities for the cars which carried lighter weights.

As usual, the GT300 field was divided into two groups for Q1 of the qualifying session. The air/track temperatures were at 21/30 degrees Celcius, which was slightly lower than expected, mainly because of the overcast sky. Regarding the Yokohama Tire users, eight cars, four each from Group A and Group B, managed to end the first section above the cut line for Q2.

Kiyoto Fujinami in Realize Nissan Automobile Technical College GT-R performed well and set the second-fastest time in Group A. Then, his co-driver Joao Paulo de Oliveira, secured the sixth grid in Q2, which was the highest place among the Yokohama shoed cars.

In the GT500 class, all three Yokohama Tires users made their way into Q2. Ritomo Miyata at the wheel of WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra was at the top of the timesheet, and Mitsunori Takaboshi in Realize Corporation ADVAN GT-R followed him in second until two of their rivals beat them in the closing minutes of Q1. Nevertheless, the third and fourth in Q1 were quite good results. Red Bull Motul Mugen NSX-GT, driven by Ukyo Sasahara, also advanced to Q2 by finishing it in sixth.

The final session saw a somewhat similar situation to Q1, as Yuji Kunimoto in the WedsSport backed Supra led the session for a while, followed by Jann Mardenborough’s GT-R in second, but they had to settle for third and fourth at the end of Q2. Still, starting the race for the second row meant the fight for a win would be well within reach for both of them. Hideki Mutoh in the Red Bull liveried NSX-GT ended Q2 in the eighth.

There was light rain in the early morning on the race day, but it stopped soon and didn’t have any impact on the Super GT track activities. In the 20-minute warm-up session just before the start, Red Bull Motul Mugen NSX-GT set the fastest time, so many expected their catch-up from the eighth grid.

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The conditions for the race were similar to that of the day before. Although there was no sign of rain, the sky was overcast, and the air/track temperatures were at 21/29 degrees, which were mostly within the anticipated range.

At the first corner after the start, however, the unexpected happened. Mutoh was hit by a car that was out of control due to a brake lock-up. Because of this, he spun and dropped to the bottom of the field.

On the other hand, Takaboshi in Realize Corporation ADVAN GT-R gained a few positions during the opening lap and became the race leader. Then the Safety Car was deployed to remove the halted car, which was involved in the incident with Mutoh, and clear up the debris from it at Turn 2. In contrast, WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra lost a position immediately after the start.

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Takaboshi stepped down from the leader, as he lost the battle for it on Lap 12, but still running in second when he came into the pit on Lap 25 to change to Mardenborogh. The Briton moved up to third by overtaking his direct rival at Turn 2, but then his car had a mechanical problem, which forced him to crawl to the pit on Lap 35. The vehicle was repaired and rejoined the race, but they lost several laps in the process and finished 14th.

Red Bull Motul Mugen NSX-GT had minor damage to its bodywork in the opening lap incident, but the other car parts were safe and sound. Mutoh steadily moved up through the field and even led the race temporarily, as the team extended his stint to Lap 31. Then Sasahara was eighth when he rejoined, and he overtook two cars, one on Lap 47 and another on three laps to go. So, they must have regretted their misfortune on the first lap…

Soon after Sasahara came up to sixth, Miyata in WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra rapidly closed in on the NSX-GT driver. The gap between them reduced to less than 0.3 seconds on the final lap, but Sasahara managed to keep his position, so they finished the race closely in tandem in sixth and seventh.

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Regarding the GT300 class, Fujinami at the wheel of Realize NATC GT-R made an excellent restart after the SC period, as he could warm up his tires properly behind the Safety Car, and he was running in fifth at the end of Lap 5. He didn’t stop there and became the race leader just ten laps later!

Fujinami continued to pull away from the others until he did driver change on Lap 29. While the team replaced all four tires at the stop, other leading cars didn’t change or changed only two tries to complete the pit stop faster. As a result, Oliveira found himself running in second, about 15 seconds behind the leader when he resumed racing.

But the Brazilian’s pace was clearly superior, so the gap with the race leader shrunk quickly. On Lap 47, he regained the lead, and no one could threaten him after that. When he saw the checkered flag, he had a huge 23-seconds margin. This was the first-ever victory in the GT300 class for Kondo Racing and Oliveira. Fujinami was one of the winning crew in the last year’s fifth-round at Fuji, but he drove only one lap in that race, which can be said his first ‘proper’ win!

As for the other Yokohama Tire users, Takashi Kogure and Yuya Motojima in JLOC Lamborghini GT3 finished in sixth. They raced steadily from the 12th grid, and Kogure even overtook the pole sitter on Lap 58. GoodSmile Hatsune Miku AMG, driven by Nobuteru Taniguchi and Tatsuya Kataoka, came in eighth, followed by Seiji Ara and Tomohide Yamaguchi in Studie BMW M6 in ninth, which was the season’s first point finish for the BMW duo.

DRIVER VOICE

Kiyoto Fujinami [Realize Nissan Automobile Technical College GT-R]

—Result : Winner. in the GT300 class—
“We had some good results in the first half of the season, but a win or a podium finish was still beyond our reach, which was so frustrating. Heading into the second half, we had a long discussion with the team to make a fresh start. Today, my team did a great job, and Yokohama provided us excellent tires, so I would say that circumstances are favorable for me to drive. The car felt really good, and I could drive steadily, managing my tires. For the last ten laps of my stint, I pushed a little bit more, because I thought the situation allowed to do so. I was just happy to hand the car to JP (de Oliveira) without any trouble.”

ENGINEER VOICE

Takayuki Shiraishi [THE YOKOHAMA RUBBER CO., LTD.]

“Realize Nissan Automobile Technical College GT-R performed well in the qualifying, and we saw this great result today. This was another proof of the dominance of GT-R at Fuji. So, I believe we can expect the car to fight for the win again in the season’s final round here.

“JLOC Lamborghini GT3 struggled in the first two races at Fuji. So, we tried a new construction to improve durability in particular at the previous round at Motegi. Those tires worked well out there, and almost the same performance level was confirmed here at Fuji this time. Therefore, this result was satisfying for us, too.

“As for the GT500 cars, it was unfortunate that Realize Corporation ADVAN GT-R had a problem during the race. The team did a superb job on the car set up, which led to a good qualifying position. So, it was a shame that such efforts didn’t bear fruit on the race day. We want to carry over the positives to the coming races.

“In the first two races, Red Bull Motul Mugen NSX-GT had difficulty with tires, especially in the aspect of durability. We had introduced a new development to sort out the issue, and we are glad to see that it worked well here. We have high hopes for these tires to perform in the next round at Suzuka, a very demanding race track on them.

“Regarding WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra, the compound which we used with the car in the second stint was quite promising, in terms of both the actual lap times and the driver’s report. So, we hope to exploit these positives in the next Suzuka round.

“Suzuka is even harsher on tires than Fuji is. This means we will have to have compounds and constructions which are able to handle the conditions. Based on the data from the third round at Suzuka and this race at Fuji, we would like to try a few things to deal effectively with the conditions there, for both GT300 and GT500 classes.”