CIVIC TYPE R-GT thrives at Fuji with the maiden win and the first 1-2 finish
Fuji SpeedwayAugust 3 (Sat) - 4 (Sun) ― The fourth round of the 2024 SUPER GT series named as “FUJI GT 350km Race” was held at Fuji Speedway (Shizuoka Pref.) and five CIVIC TYPE R-GT cars and a NSX-GT3 car participated in each of the GT500 and GT300 class. Whereas the second and third round of the 2024 SUPER GT series were held on the “3-hour” time-oriented format in which the 2-stop strategy became the default practice, this round (4th) was run as a 350km-race associated with just one stop.
After an interval of two months since the previous race, Fuji Speedway on August 3rd (Sat), with the rainy season over well before, met the midsummer sun shining through the thin clouds sizzling the entire venue right from the morning. The official practice sessions took place under the extreme conditions especially for both ambient and road surface temperatures.
CIVIC TYPE R-GT cars were generally in good shape and marked better times utilizing the already renowned top-end speed. #64 Modulo CIVIC TYPE R-GT (Takuya Izawa/Riki Okusa) did the top time followed by #100 STANLEY CIVIC TYPE R-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Tadasuke Makino) in 2nd, and the Honda squadron set all ready for the qualifying sessions to be scheduled in the afternoon.
The 10-minute Q1 session was started at 3:03 p.m., when the conditions got even harsher with the ambient and road surface temperatures hiked up to 33℃ and 50℃ respectively. #100 (Makino), #64 (Okusa) and #8 ARTA MUGEN CIVIC TYPE R-GT (Nobuharu Matsushita) made the clean sweep of the top-3 slots, and #16 ARTA MUGEN CIVIC TYPE R-GT (Hiroki Otsu), #17 Astemo CIVIC TYPE R-GT (Kakunoshin Ohta) followed suit another two slots, making up the monopoly of the CIVIC comrade in the highest orders towards the Q2 session.
The Q2 session was started at 3:59 p.m. The 10-minute trial went under the condition still harsh but slightly lighten in the temperatures, and #8 car (Tomoki Nojiri) captured the pole position by marking the top "Q1-2" aggregated times. With #100 car (Yamamoto) and #64 car (Izawa) sitting in the next two slots, the CIVIC TYPE R-GT trio achieved the 1-2-3 for the starting order. In addition, #17 car (Koudai Tsukakoshi) and #16 (Ren Sato) came in 5th and 10th, which definitely shows the Honda’s momentum is about to come.
August 4 (Sun) was yet another fine day. The race was started at 2:30 p.m., and the top-3 runners, #8 car (Nojiri), the pole sitter, then #100 car (Makino) and #64 (Izawa) duly secured each position. The front-running car, #8 (Nojiri) kept on pushing hard right from the start and gradually pulled away from #100 car (Makino) running 2nd.
Shortly before the halfway point, #64 car (Izawa) allowed #14 ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra close in on, and then get ahead at the last corner on Lap-26. The bottom piece of CIVIC TTPE R-GT’s 1-2-3 formation thus has been missing, however, #8 car (Nojiri) and #100 (Makino) maintained the top-2 positions and kept on going. #100 car (Makino) made its stop on Lap-32 and so did #8 (Nojiri) on Lap-34 and the both cars returned to the course with keeping the virtual position of each.
The gap between #8 car (Matsushita) and #100 (Yamamoto) that had been hovering around 4-sec. till the pit stop was gradually reduced thereafter, however, #8 car (Matsushita) revived its pace when the gap became 1-sec. or so, and began pulling off yet again. The race came to an end as it was; #8 car (Matsushita) firstly received the checkered flag and #100 car (Yamamoto) next. It is the maiden victory for CIVIC TYPE R-GT and also the first 1-2 finish for the debutant model. #64 car (Okusa) finished 6th, #17 (Tsukakoshi) 8th, a total of 4 CIVICs scored series points. At the end of the day, #100 car (Yamamoto/Makino) climbed up to 2nd overall in the series ranking with a total of 37-points, and #8 car (Nojiri/Matsushita) jumped up to 6th overall with a total of 26-points which is the runner-up position among the CIVIC TYPE R-GT brigade.
It’s the very first season for the new model, CIVIC TYPE R-GT. I’m relieved that we could finally win in the 4th round. We did pretty good job in the qualifying runs for the first three rounds, but when it came to the race, we struggled a little bit with technical troubles, lack of pace or whatever, and lost some positions. But today, we could maintain our qualifying positions all the way to the checkered flag. Still, we had several cars that weren’t keeping up with the race pace as was expected. We have to look into the shortcomings and try to jack up the performance bottom line so that we, as a whole united team, can tackle the championship title.
It’s the very first season for the new model, CIVIC TYPE R-GT. I’m relieved that we could finally win in the 4th round. We did pretty good job in the qualifying runs for the first three rounds, but when it came to the race, we struggled a little bit with technical troubles, lack of pace or whatever, and lost some positions. But today, we could maintain our qualifying positions all the way to the checkered flag. Still, we had several cars that weren’t keeping up with the race pace as was expected. We have to look into the shortcomings and try to jack up the performance bottom line so that we, as a whole united team, can tackle the championship title.
I’ve had some races in which the “gears” didn’t mesh smoothly so far till today. It’s why I firmly determined to win this one, and pushed hard as much as possible, lap in lap out, in order to run away from Makino, my immediate and imminent pursuer. To my gratitude, I could widen the gap as I wished, which made be convinced, even in afterthought, that I did all what I had to do in my stint. I’ve been honored to be involved in the development of CIVIC TYPE R-GT, and I feel I’m responsible, in one way or other, for the delay in balancing the straight speed and the cornering performance, and in the result, kept our fans waiting such a long time till we show them winning a race. All in all, I’m extremely happy that I could take my part in winning the maiden victory of the new car.
I’ve had some races in which the “gears” didn’t mesh smoothly so far till today. It’s why I firmly determined to win this one, and pushed hard as much as possible, lap in lap out, in order to run away from Makino, my immediate and imminent pursuer. To my gratitude, I could widen the gap as I wished, which made be convinced, even in afterthought, that I did all what I had to do in my stint. I’ve been honored to be involved in the development of CIVIC TYPE R-GT, and I feel I’m responsible, in one way or other, for the delay in balancing the straight speed and the cornering performance, and in the result, kept our fans waiting such a long time till we show them winning a race. All in all, I’m extremely happy that I could take my part in winning the maiden victory of the new car.
There had been races that looked like for us to win, or to be on the podium at least, but in reality, neither of the case actually been materialized. So, I took the win as if we succeeded a twofold revenge, and that’s thankful. Tomoki’s pace in the first stint was fantastic, and he made the gap from the car behind wide enough, I mean, building the safety margin that would nullify any loss incurred by accident during pit stop. I think that’s the biggest reason that we could win. My stint was a bit longer, and it’s very hot. I didn’t know how the tire wear would proceed. So, I told myself, just calm down and drive as steadily as possible. That’s the reason why my pace was slightly slower than #100 car, but as I saw it in the mirror, I thought I shouldn’t sit on the status quo, and began pushing harder again. After that, I think I’d run the rest of the race with everything under control.
There had been races that looked like for us to win, or to be on the podium at least, but in reality, neither of the case actually been materialized. So, I took the win as if we succeeded a twofold revenge, and that’s thankful. Tomoki’s pace in the first stint was fantastic, and he made the gap from the car behind wide enough, I mean, building the safety margin that would nullify any loss incurred by accident during pit stop. I think that’s the biggest reason that we could win. My stint was a bit longer, and it’s very hot. I didn’t know how the tire wear would proceed. So, I told myself, just calm down and drive as steadily as possible. That’s the reason why my pace was slightly slower than #100 car, but as I saw it in the mirror, I thought I shouldn’t sit on the status quo, and began pushing harder again. After that, I think I’d run the rest of the race with everything under control.
GT500 Race Result
Pos. | Num. | Machine | Driver | Time/Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 8 | ARTA MUGEN CIVIC TYPE R-GT #8 | Tomoki Nojiri | 2:00'43.329 |
2 | 100 | STANLEY CIVIC TYPE R-GT | Naoki Yamamoto | +3.277 |
3 | 38 | KeePer CERUMO GR Supra | Hiroaki Ishiura | +12.233 |
4 | 14 | ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra | Kazuya Oshima | +14.725 |
5 | 12 | MARELLI IMPUL Z | Kazuki Hiramine | +18.894 |
6 | 64 | Modulo CIVIC TYPE R-GT | Takuya Izawa | +24.192 |
8 | 17 | Astemo CIVIC TYPE R-GT | Koudai Tsukakoshi | +44.929 |
11 | 16 | ARTA MUGEN CIVIC TYPE R-GT #16 | Hiroki Otsu | +57.285 |
GT300 Race Result
Pos. | Num. | Machine | Driver | Time/Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 65 | LEON PYRAMID AMG | Naoya Gamou | 2:01'50.865 |
2 | 4 | GOODSMILE HATSUNEMIKU AMG | Nobuteru Taniguchi | +31.647 |
3 | 56 | REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R | Daiki Sasaki | +1Lap |
4 | 777 | D'station Vantage GT3 | Tomonobu Fujii | +1Lap |
5 | 88 | JLOC Lamborghini GT3 | Takashi Kogure | +1Lap |
6 | 87 | METALIVE S Lamborghini GT3 | Kosuke Matsuura | +1Lap |
16 | 18 | UPGARAGE NSX GT3 | Takashi Kobayashi | +1Lap |
GT500 Ranking
Pos. | Num. | Machine | Driver | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 36 | Sho Tsuboi | au TOM'S GR Supra | 41 |
2 | 100 | Naoki Yamamoto | STANLEY CIVIC TYPE R-GT | 37 |
3 | 3 | Mitsunori Takaboshi | Niterra MOTUL Z | 30 |
4 | 37 | Ukyo Sasahara | Deloitte TOM'S GR Supra | 28 |
5 | 14 | Kazuya Oshima | ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra | 27 |
6 | 8 | Tomoki Nojiri | ARTA MUGEN CIVIC TYPE R-GT #8 | 26 |
9 | 17 | Koudai Tsukakoshi | Astemo CIVIC TYPE R-GT | 22 |
12 | 16 | Hiroki Otsu | ARTA MUGEN CIVIC TYPE R-GT #16 | 15 |
13 | 64 | Takuya Izawa | Modulo CIVIC TYPE R-GT | 7 |
GT300 Ranking
Pos. | Num. | Machine | Driver | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 2 | Yuui Tsutsumi | muta Racing GR86 GT | 46 |
2 | 65 | Naoya Gamou | LEON PYRAMID AMG | 44 |
3 | 88 | Takashi Kogure | JLOC Lamborghini GT3 | 32 |
4 | 777 | Tomonobu Fujii | D'station Vantage GT3 | 31 |
5 | 4 | Nobuteru Taniguchi | GOODSMILE HATSUNEMIKU AMG | 28 |
6 | 56 | Daiki Sasaki | REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R | 27 |
15 | 18 | Takashi Kobayashi | UPGARAGE NSX GT3 | 4 |
