2014.07.20

Rd.4 Winners Interview

Round 4 Sportsland Sugo : Winners Interview

No.1 ZENT CERUMO RC F

 

I am happy with this win. The balance wasn’t very good in wet conditions. But when it started to rain, things weren’t so bad, and with the track only slightly wet like it was in the race, there was no problem running on dry-use tires. [Kohei] Hirate ran well in the first half and got us a good lead. Also the team made the right decision [in not changing to wet tires], so all I had to do was just drive. That’s how things went. But when it began to rain again in the later stages of the race I had to really concentrate. For me personally, this is my 16th GT500 career win, is it? My biggest aim is to win the championship title, but every win gets us closer to the title, so I’m really happy with today’s result.

 

Tachikawa-san just said that the team made the right decision [about changing tires], but in fact that decision was delayed a bit (grimace). A lot of the teams decided to change tires soon after the start, but those of us whose decisions were delayed ended up staying out on the track as our strategy. That turned out to be the right choice and made a big difference. The car had a good balance in the race, so just running normally I was able to keep building a lead. But, we never knew when it was going to start raining again, so I pushed and tried to build up as much of a lead as I could, and eventually I was able to turn the car over to Tachikawa-san with about a 20-second lead. I have a newborn son, so I am especially happy to be able to take this win home as a present.

 

 

 

No.88 MANEPA LAMBORGHINI GT3

 

I don’t want to sound like I’m bragging, but today’s win was really a lucky one (wry smile). It is the first win in a long time and I am really glad about that. I am glad that we won in the Lamborghini and also happy to have won it teaming with [Takayuki] Aoki. I’m glad that we kept on trying until we finally won together as we hoped to. Our strategy of going without a tire change was also right on target, and I am grateful to Yokohama Tire for making it possible. In our Suzuka tests we found good tires and that contributed to this win. I want to thank the team, Aoki, the people at Yokohama and our sponsors.

 

I was the one who drove for the qualifying and I was determined to get a good time on my first [timed] lap. But, that used up the best part of the intermediate (light rain) tires I was running on and I ended up in 9th place. In the end, that turned out to be a fortunate thing, didn’t it? That’s because, while the others were battling in a frenzied state, I was able to start out calmly. And, as I was driving steadily on the others around me were falling away, and before I realized it I was in 2nd place. I turned the car over to [Manabu] Orido in 2nd position, and coming out of the pit with the tire change he was able to take 1st place. After that, I watched nervously on the monitor in the pit as Orido kept up a fast pace. It has been such a long time since the last win for us that I will have to do some research on it, but I hope this will be the start of more good things for us.

 

 

Page Top