Victory for Niterra Nissan Z at Fuji !

The FUJI GT 450km RACE, Round 4 of the 2023 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series, took place on August 6th at Fuji Speedway (one lap 4,563 x 100 laps) in Shizuoka Prefecture. With rain falling on and off and race stoppage due to accidents, the GT500 class race saw the No. 3 Niterra MOTUL Z (Katsumasa Chiyo/Mitsunori Takaboshi) take the lead in the final stages and run on to victory. In the GT300 class, victory went to the No. 11 GAINER TANAX GT-R (Ryuichiro Tomita/Keishi Ishikawa/Yusuke Shiotsu) that started from 3rd position on the grid.

Due to the rain that fell before the start of the race, it had to be started with the Safety Car leading the field. Once the race got underway, it was subject to unrelenting changes in the weather and accidents that stopped the race, resulting in upsets that brought frequent changes in the top order.

Amid this confusion, it was the No. 3 Niterra MOTUL Z (Katsumasa Chiyo/Mitsunori Takaboshi) that showed impressive speed from the early stages of the race. Having started from 4th position on the grid, Chiyo drove the No. 3 car forward to take 2nd place by the 3rd lap once passing was allowed, and finally to pass the pole-starting car No. 24 on the 4th lap to take the lead. As the weather improved after that, the cars behind began to switch to slick tires one after another and increase their pace until No. 3, which had kept to the track until the 15th lap without making a pit stop found itself dropped to 4th position.

However, when a fire broke out in one of the GT300 cars, the race had to be stopped temporarily, just as rain began to fall hard again. With this, it was made possible for the cars to change to rain tires for safety reasons. As had been shown at the start of the race, the Michelin tires used by car No. 3 performed with proven speed. When the race was restarted, No. 3 moved up to 3rd place by the 72nd lap and then on to quickly retake the lead by the 74th lap. After that it never gave the competitors a chance close the gap, as it ran on to finish the 100th lap with a big lead of 2 min. and 54.244 sec. to claim its first win of the season and take the lead in the point ranking as well.

Finishing the race in 2nd and 3rd places were two Honda NSX-GT cars that also came on very strong in the final stages of the race, the No. 16 ARTA MUGEN NSX-GT (Nirei Fukuzumi/Hiroki Otsu) and the No. 100 STANLEY NSX-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Tadasuke Makino). However, after the race it was decided that there had been violations in these two cars pit work during their pit stops, which caused 40 sec. to be added to their race results. This meant that 2nd place went to the No. 64 Modulo NSX-GT (Takuya Izawa/Kakunoshin Ohta), while 3rd place went to car No. 16. As for car No. 100, its place dropped to 6th. Among the TOYOTA GR Supra GT500 cars, it was the No. 36 au TOM'S GR Supra (Sho Tsuboi/Ritomo Miyata) that performed the best. Having started the race in 15th place at the very back of the pack, No. 36 rose steadily to finish the race first among the GR Supra cars in 5th place. But due to the penalty placed on car No. 100, No.

36 was move up to finish in 4th place.

In the GT300 class, the pole-sitting No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNEMIKU AMG (Nobuteru Taniguchi/Tatsuya Kataoka) got a slow start in the rain, losing the lead at one point to the No.

11 GAINER TANAX GT-R (Ryuichiro Tomita/Keishi Ishikawa/Yusuke Shiotsu). As the track dried after that, No. 4 regained the lead. However, just after changing to dry-use tires, No. 4 accidentally ran off the track. On the other hand, it was Tomita in car No. 11 who was able to pass the cars in front still running on rain tires one after another and race on to a dramatic win.

Finishing in 2nd place was the winner of the previous round, the No. 7 Studie BMW M4 (Seiji Ara/Masataka Yanagida). Finishing in 3rd place was the No. 6 DOBOT Audi R8 LMS (Yoshiaki Katayama/Roberto Merhi Muntan/Seiya Jin), with the added joy of taking their first podium finish.

(Spectators: Aug 6th (race day) 30,200, Aug. 5th (qualifying day) 20,200

■ Winner Comments

No. 3 Niterra MOTUL Z [GT500]

Katsumasa Chiyo: “The race started in the rain, but once again I was able to drive with confidence because of the outstanding performance of the Michelin wet-use tires. Later, with the change in the weather, the going was hard for us because of an inability to predict the weather as the track dried out. But when the track became wet again, Takaboshi-san ran strongly (to keep us in the lead). The team also applied their strategy well and everyone worked hard to get us this win. There were a number of problems with our last race at Suzuka, but I’m glad to say that there was nothing to complain about this time.

Mitsunori Takaboshi: “We were able to overwhelm the other competitors this time by taking good advantage of the strength of the Michelin tires we use, which is their performance in the rain. So, I am simply very happy with this result. There were dry conditions at the time of the race’s second restart, so I didn’t know what would happen. But since things had gone well in yesterday’s qualifying, and for that reason we knew we could get good results in both dry and wet conditions, but I guess the rain made things easier for us (laughs).”

No. 11 GAINER TANAX GT-R [GT300]

Ryuichiro Tomita: “There were a number of upsets from the beginning of the race, which made it a very difficult race. Despite the conditions, Keishi (Ishikawa) drove very well for us. (When I was driving in the latter half of the race) the team decided on the change in tires with perfect timing, and I am very happy that we were able to take the lead in the last few laps and win the race.”

Keishi Ishikawa: “(At the start of the race) it was good that we started out on wet-use tires, but we were quickly passed. But since we were able to keep up with the two leaders, I thought that we would have a good chance in the long run if we kept on that way. This time, since Tomita-san has been driving well for so long, I thought he would do the job for us (in the second half).”

*Yusuke Shiotsu ended up not driving during the race.