2021 Japanese Rally Championship Round 10 Report

【Japanese Rally Championship Round 10 / Takayama city】

Drastic Condition Change Affects Traditional Event.
Okumura Runner-up In JN-4 In His First JRC Appearance.

JRC Round 10

Date 15-17/10/2021
Venue Takayama city, Gifu
Weather Leg1 : Fine / Leg2 : Rain – Cloudy
Surface Leg1 : Dry / Leg2 : Wet – Dry (Tarmac)
Total distance 374.26km
Total SS distance 59.82km
2021 JRC Round 10

Having had two gravel events recently, the 2021 Japanese Rally Championship returned to the asphalt roads for the first time in four months. The 48th M.C.S.C. Rally Highland Masters, the tenth championship round, has the longest history in the current JRC calendar. As the event had to be canceled last year, Hida Takayama in Gifu Prefecture welcomed the rally cars’ exhaust sound after a two-year absence.

Rally Highland Masters was supposed to be the championship’s final round but now became the penultimate one because Kuma-Kogen Rally, the fourth round initially scheduled in May, had to be moved to the last weekend of October.

The itinerary consisted of 12 special stages for two days, Saturday and Sunday. The famous stage between Musugo and Arkopia was used on both days in different directions. Leg 1 on Saturday included Ushimaki, which was run in a downhill direction for the first time since 2018, and the newly created Senkoji. For Leg 2 on Sunday, Aoya and Ohyama-sen were set up.

The event began with recce, sign-in, and vehicle scrutineering on Friday, October 15th. Under the clear autumn sky, the day’s high even reached 25 degrees centigrade. However, the forecast already said that you would need an umbrella from Saturday evening to the morning hours of Sunday, so the drastic condition change during the event was inevitable.

As the rules allowed only six tires for each crew, they puzzled over whether Leg 2 would be run on the wet surfaces for a whole day, or the road would be dry again during the leg, assuming the anticipated rain would stop early or would be very light.

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Leg 1 got underway on Saturday, October 16th, under a blue sky with some clouds. Hiroshi Yanagisawa / Takahiro Yasui in Skoda Fabia R5 finished the opening stage, Musugo-Arkopia 1 (5.82km), in third, and they were the fastest Yokohama Tire users in the JN-1 class. But Hiroki Arai / Noritaka Kosaka, driving Subaru WRX STI, Fumio Nutahara / Shungo Azuma in Toyota GR Yaris, and Toshihiro Arai / Naoya Tanaka pair’s Subaru ended the stage within the one-second gap.

Then Nutahara moved up to the second by setting the third-fastest time in SS2 Ushimaki Down (6.12km) because one of his rivals spun during the stage and Yanagisawa to third for the same reason.

Senkoji 1 (3.23km) was an uphill stage with a lot of tight corners. The stage’s characteristics gave an advantage to R5 cars, so Yanagisawa took over second by setting the second-fastest time. The second section of the day after the midday service, where these three stages were repeated, saw Nutahara and Yanagisawa swapping their positions after each stage. As it turned out, Yanagisawa ended Leg 1 in third and Nutahara in fourth by only 0.5 seconds.

The anticipated rain started to fall on Saturday night, and the competitors faced the wet roads in the morning of Sunday, October 17th. Considering such conditions, the rally control decided to add two more tires to each crew’s allowance, which meant they could use up to eight tires. Therefore, the tire service crew, who supported the competitors by mounting tires on rims and dismounting them, became even busier from the early morning.

But the first stage of the day, SS7 Aoya Up 1 (8.64km), which was the longest of the rally, was canceled. According to the report from the Marshall Car, which inspects each stage route before the start, the surfaces were covered with the wet fallen leaves and mud in places, and the conditions were totally different from those when the competitors did recce. Hence, the rally control made the call for safety reasons.

However, the rain had already eased off. And, when the rally crews arrived at Aoya Up again (SS10), the second half of the stage was almost dried. They saw similar conditions for the remaining two stages, and Hiroki Arai clocked the second-fastest time in SS11 Ohyamasen 2 (4.55km) against R5 cars, which had a certain advantage here. Then Nutahara came in third in the stage time of Arkopia-Musugo 2 (5.87km), the rally’s final stage. But the Yokohama Tire users generally struggled on the wet roads, and Nutahara’s fourth overall was the best result.

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In JN-4, Daichi Okumura / Masanori Ohashi in Suzuki Swift attracted more and more attention after each stage. Driving a brand-new car which they just finished the preparation work in August, Okumura set the second-fastest time in SS3 and then the third fastest in the following two stages, despite this being his first appearance in JRC. Thus, he finished Leg 1 in third, 13.8 seconds behind the second.

On the wet surfaces in Leg 2, Okumura was 7.2 seconds – roughly 1.6 seconds per kilometer – faster than his direct competition, who was running in second, in SS8. Then, the gap with the rival was reduced to merely 0.3 seconds, as he drove SS9 more than 1 second per kilometer faster again. Now the second place was well within Okumura’s reach.

Then came the final section, which started with SS10 Aoya Up 2, the repeat of the canceled SS7. There were still wet and slippery places on the stage, but Okumura snatched second place here by setting the second-fastest time, more than two seconds per kilometer faster than the rival. After that, he managed to keep the position and finished in runner-up to their joy.

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One of the standouts in JN-3 was a circuit race veteran Manabu Orido in Toyota 86. This was his second time to enter a JRC tarmac rally this year since he drove in Montre 2021 in June. Reunion with Mami Yamamoto, he looked promising, especially after setting the third-fastest time in SS3.

Sure enough, winning SS4 by 0.4 seconds and clocking the third fastest in SS5 and 6, Orido ended Leg 1 in third place. He showed his pace even on the wet surface and finished SS8 in second. However, he had a gearbox problem during the stage and lost the fourth gear, which resulted in retirement at the end of the stage. It was disappointing, but he certainly proved his speed on the rally stages again.

Orido’s exit meant one position gain for Seiji Yamaguchi / Kazuhiro Funaki, driving Toyota 86. They were the fifth at the end of Leg 1 but came up to third in SS9, in which the road surfaces were still wet. Then, with the conditions getting better, Yamaguchi set the second-fastest time in SS11 and 12 to secure third place. It was good to get on the podium for the pair because this was the first time in eight years for them to share a car in a rally event!

DRIVER VOICE

Daichi Okumura [Suzuki Swift]

—Result : 2nd. in the JN-4 class—
“I have been rallying for six years now, and my main activities before that were gymkhana and dirt trial events when I belonged to the automobile club in my university. I was born in Hokkaido, and I just thought, ‘I want to do this!’ when I watched Rally Japan there!”

“I live in Gunma Prefecture now. Starting from the area’s local events, I gained experience little by little, and this was the first time to compete in the Japanese Championship event. We built a Swift two years ago, but I totaled it by my mistake. Then we prepared the new car from scratch and finished the work in August to enter this event. Despite the rally control’s decision about tires, we completed the rally with just six tires. I am happy with the result, as we could battle against more experienced strong opponents.

“When I lost my first car, some people around me discouraged me to continue. But I didn’t crack up and tried to cultivate myself as much as possible. And that attitude eventually led to this result, I believe. I hope to do selected JRC events next year, and will try to win the championship, which is my personal goal, during the years after that!”