2016.11.13

VivaC 86 MC Takes Brilliant Tactical Win and with It the GT300 Championship!

Round8 Twin Ring Motegi : Race GT300 Review

The MOTEGI GT GRAND FINAL, Round 8 (final round) of the 2016 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series, was held at Twin Ring Motegi in Tochigi Pref. on November 13. In the GT500 class, running from pole position to win the race was the No. 39 DENSO KOBELCO SARD RC F (Heikki Kovalainen/ Kohei Hirate), and this victory also brought the team the 2016 season double championship (Drivers and Team titles). In the GT300 class, the No. 25 VivaC 86 MC (Takeshi Tsuchiya/Takamitsu Matsui) won the race and in doing so also won the GT300 class Drivers and Team Championship titles.

 

 

 

 

Flying into the lead from the GT300 pole position, the No. 31 TOYOTA PRIUS apr GT (Koki Saga) stayed there through the first turn. Running in 2nd place, the No. 65 LEON CVSTOS AMG-GT (Haruki Kurosawa) wove back and forth behind car No. 31 looking for a space to exploit but was unable to overtake it, remaining in its grid order and they came out of the second turn of lap one. After starting from 3rd position on the grid, the No. 88 MANEPA LAMBORGHINI GT3 (Manabu Orido) followed, also in its grid order. Behind them, however, the first upset of the race was about to occur. Having started from the outside on the grid, the No. 9 GULF NAC PORSCHE 911 (Hiroki Yoshida) and the No. 25 VivaC 86 MC (Takeshi Tsuchiya) lost a lot of ground after the start, while in contrast, the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG (Tatsuya Kataoka) and No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Hideki Yamauchi) were able to move to the front, in position to chase the three lead.
A slight gap separated the tightly bunched front pack of five machines, but from sixth place down there was another group of nearly ten machines running in a closely linked line battling to move up in position. At the front of that second group sat the slow starting car No. 9, but on the fifth lap it was replaced by the No. 18 UPGARAGE BANDOH 86 (Yuki Nakayama). Around this time, car No. 31 was opening up a gap ahead of car No. 65. Meanwhile, car No. 65 had car No. 88 closing in on its tail, but not for long. On the downhill of lap number seven, No. 88 began to fall off the pace. There appeared to be trouble with its drive shaft and it headed straight for the pit.
Also, at the back of the second pack, Tsuchiya in the title-contending car No. 25 was not increasing his pace, perhaps out of concern for saving his tires for later. After being passed by the No. 26 AUDI R8 LMS (Yuya Motojima), he was then getting pressure from behind, where a hard-charging No. 3 B-MAX NDDP GT-R (Kazuki Hoshino) was closing in.
As the lead cars were entering the 15th lap of the race, the pits were getting busy in preparation for the routine pit stops. Then, planning early pit stops, car No. 65 running in 2nd position and car No. 25, which had settled into 10th position, both headed toward the pit lane. The No. 65 LEON CVSTOS AMG-GT changed only its two rear tires, while the No. 25 VivaC 86 MC went through with its no-tire-change strategy. Finishing it pit stop in just 20 seconds, or about half of the time its rivals would take, car No. 25 succeeded in moving up quite a way through the field. From there, the team’s title hopes would depend on the driving of Takamitsu Matsui. Matsui found car No. 65 (Naoya Gamou) running in front of him with its newly changed tires not yet warmed up and seized the opportunity to catch and pass it in the approach to the third corner.

 

 

As the race entered the second half, the leading No. 31 TOYOTA PRIUS apr GT also made its routine pit stop and changed drivers from Saga to Yuichi Nakayama. In order to stay in the lead, the team decided that they two would hurry through the stop with no tire change. Knowing that speed goes hand-in-hand with tire durability, they were taking a gamble in order to stay in the lead.
After the 24th lap, the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi > Hideki Yamauchi), No. 18 UPGARAGE BANDOH 86 (Nakayama > Shinnosuke Yamada), No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG (Kataoka > Nobuteru Taniguchi) and the No. 21 Hitotsuyama Audi R8 LMS (Richard Lyons > Tomonobu Fujii) made their routine pit stops one after another. As a result, the cars’ relative positions changed rapidly.
By the time all of the leading teams had finished their pit stops, the No. 31 TOYOTA PRIUS apr GT (Nakayama) was back in the lead. And who should be right behind it but its rival, the No. 25 VivaC 86 MC (Matsui), which had been pushing at a tremendous pace after its pit stop. Matsui’s pace never faltered, and Nakayama found that he couldn’t keep pace with No. 25. Finally, on the “V” corner of the 34th lap, car No. 25 managed to pass No. 31, thus singlehandedly bringing the title within reach.

 

 

After that, No. 31 did its best to not let No. 25 get away, but the best it could do was to keep on the pressure from a gap varying between one and three seconds behind. Behind these two lead cars, about eight seconds back came car No. 65 and the No. 26 AUDI R8 LMS (Tsubasa Kondo), followed closely by the No. 3 B-MAX NDDP GT-R (Kazuki Hoshino > Jann Mardenborough) and No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG (Taniguchi), with all four machines battling to try to win the last spot on the last podium of the season. With ten laps remaining, the No. 65 car running in 3rd position began to slow down and was forced to go back to its pit. As the remaining three cars, No. 26, No. 3 and No. 4 now battled for 3rd place, the competition heated up further. With car No. 26 losing speed, it soon fell back. On the “V” corner of the 46th lap, cars No. 3 and No. 4 collided with each other and No. 3 soon dropped away due to resulting machine damage. This gave car No. 4 its first podium finish since the opening round of the season.
Over the last five laps of the race, the No. 25 car’s tires began to lose performance and Nakayama in the trailing car No. 31 made a last-ditch effort to close the gap. Even if it finished second in this race, car No. 25’s season title win was already assured. Nonetheless, Matsui’s pride was on the line and he held on with a great show of determination. In the end, the No. 25 VivaC 86 MC crossed the finish line with a 0.929 sec. lead to take its second win of the season. For the team it came as a felicitous double championship of Drivers and Team titles.

 

 

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