In less than spectacular weather, Sportsland SUGO welcomed an impressive crowd of 51,500 for Round 2 of the 2004 AUTOBACS JGTC, showing signs of the continuing growth in the popularity of Japan's premiere motorsports series. All that made the journey to the circuit Miyagi Prefecture were witness to most eventful 81-lap race. Toyota cars were the call of the day, the No.38 Supra driven by Yuji Tachikawa and Seiji Ara winning the GT500 class and the No.19 Celica driven by Takayuki Aoki and Nobuteru Taniguchi claiming the GT300 victory.

Amazement could have been the keyword of the day, and it started early. One of the race favorites, the No.1 Fairlady Z, failed to complete the formation lap. First stint driver Motoyama could do nothing as the transmission began acting up, bringing the day for the Nissan car to an end before it had even started.
The race started without a major incident, and it looked as if the No.25 Supra was going to run away with everything, Orido using "Super Soft" compound tires and driving hard at a lap rhythm that was more than 2 sec faster than second-running Iida in the No.6 Supra. Third in the pack was the No.22 Nissan Fairlady Z driven by Kageyama and fourth another Supra, the No.38 car driven by Ara. But the No.25 Supra couldn't maintain the initial lap pace, and by lap 10, Iida had closed the gap to within striking distance of the leader. The push came on lap 16. Iida patiently waited for the open door, and finding it slipped by into the lead.

A bit further back, behind the No.22 Nissan (Kageyama) and No.38 Toyota (Ara), the No.39 (Dufour) and No.36 (Tsuchiya) Supras fought a nose-to-tail battle for 5th place. Ara worked his way up to Kageyama and overtook to move into 3rd on lap 27. Dufour, who had successfully maneuvered into 5th, took advantage of Kageyama's stymied rhythm following Ara's move and overtook as well. The No.25 Supra was slowed by a back marker, allowing Ara to catch Orido and pass on lap 28 to put the No.38 car into second, only a few seconds behind Iida in the No.6 Supra.

On the following lap, to the surprise and excitement of all, the No.39 (Dufour) and No.36 (Tsuchiya) Supras were at it again, joggling for position in the first corner. The cars bumped, sending them both into spins, and Kageyama, close behind, collided with Dufour's Supra. Tsuchiya quickly rejoined the race, but Dufour sustained damage to the rear suspension and had to return to his pit for repairs. The front end of the No.22 Fairlady was damaged in the collision, requiring Kageyama to pit as well. But another Fairlady Z rose to the challenge of taking on the front-running Toyotas, Ide in the No. 12 Fairlady Z entered by TEAM IMPUL. Before going in for the team's first routine stop, Ide successfully worked weaved his way up through the field and overtook Orido to take 3rd place. Going into the pits for routine stops the leading order as No.6 Supra and No.38 Supra. But coming out of the pits, the positions had been reversed, Tachikawa leading in the No.38 car and Wakisaka pushing the No.6 Supra hard in an effort to catch up.

On lap 49 the No.12 Fairlady Z, driven by Treluyer after the driver's change during the routine stop, was imposed a drive-thru penalty for inadvertently passing on the white at the pit lane exit. Serving the penalty, the car feel three positions to 8th.

Fans across the circuit moved to the edges watching a thrilling performance by Wakisaka and the No.6 Supra as he skillfully threaded his way through the back markers and reduced the time separating him and the No.38 Supra. On lap 54, Wakisaka passed Tachikawa and took the lead, but not for long. Moments later, in the process of passing a GT300 Porsche back marker, he was forced to go wide when the driver didn't see him and half of his car left the track. A wheel was damaged, and Wakisaka was forced to pit to change it.

It seemed as though the No.38 Supra would cruise to victory, but rain began to fall around lap 60, re-introducing uncertainty to the winning equation. Most of the cars in the top group chose to pit and change to rain tires. But not so for leader Tachikawa in the No.38 Supra and 2nd running Schwager in the No.25 Supra, both were determined to keep running on slicks.

Yet another Fairlady Z Nissan poked its nose into contention for the podium, the No.3 car driven by Erik Comas. Comas also wooed spectators with his skillful driving, moving up to 4th in spite of the slick surface conditions. The rain began falling harder, and the remaining cars that had not pitted for rain tires earlier began to go in, including Comas. All except one, that is: Schwager in the No.25 Supra. The German driver remained on the track and took the lead, driving however with slicks on a wet surface. Tachikawa, having pitted and switched to rain tires, began closing the gap rapidly. With just three laps to go, Tachikawa got by Schwager to take the lead again. There was a sufficient gap between Schwager and the No.37 Supra (Courtney) to allow the No.25 to finish second and the No.37 car finished third. Behind him were Hattori in the No.35 Supra and Matsuda in the No.32 Honda NSX. Matsuda overtook Hattori on lap 79 and they finished in that order.

GT500 Winner

No.38 au CERUMO SUPRA

Yuji Tachikawa: "I'm very happy after waiting so long for this victory. I had several chances to win races last year, but lost them due to mistakes or bad luck. This victory is the most gratifying of all my wins as it came under difficult conditions. We communicated by radio, and the team crew prepared the tires so we could change whenever we felt necessary. When it started raining hard, I said over the radio, "I cannot drive anymore!" when I was in the last corner and went into the pit immediately. It was a marvelous timing."

Seiji Ara: "I was disappointed to lose positions at the start. But I still managed to close the gap. I wanted to pass the wheel over to Tachikawa while being on top. All of the Supras are the same configuration and the drivers are good, so it's hard to win a race. Even so, our combination is good and car development has gone well. We'll plan on getting as many points as possible. And even though I think we'll have some hard races, we're competing for the title."

The opening laps were controlled by pole sitter Yamaji in the No.7 Mazda RX-7, closely followed by Yamano in the No.16 Honda NSX, Yoshimoto in the No.63 Vemac and Aoki in the No.19 Celica. On lap 8, the No.16 NSX took the lead and Yoshimoto squeezed the No.63 Vemac in right behind him, taking up second. From this point on, it seemed that the first half of the race was a battle for the lead between the No.8 NSX (Yamano) and No.63 Vemac (Yoshimoto). Yoshimoto skillfully got by the NSX on lap 18 and led the GT300 pack for 15 laps, until being overtaken by Yamano on lap 33. The closest group was Yamaji in the No.7 Mazda (3rd), Tanaka in the No.10 Ferrari (4th) and Aoki in the No.19 Celica (5th).

The Honda managed to maintain the lead through the routine pit stop. But the second stint driver, Yagi, suffered two spins in the latter stages of the race that took the victory away from Honda. The No.63 Vemac, too, lost momentum in the second half of the race and dropped positions in the field. Contrary to this, the No.19 Celica ran steady and strong, and cruised across the finish line first for the victory. The other Celica, No.17 driven by Nagashima in the second half of the race, advanced up through the field and finished second, giving Toyota a 1-2 finish. Matsuda gave a good performance with the No.11 Ferrari as well, moving up positions under difficult conditions and a drive-thru penalty to finish third.

GT300 Winner

No.19 WedsSport CELICA

Takayuki Aoki: "We won the race as the result of total performance, pit work included. Our strategy was to start the race with a full tank of fuel and keep the RX-7 or Ferraris in sight and then overtake them at the pit stop. We were successful at executing that. However, we were unable to match the speeds of the Vemac and Honda. Our Celica can make good speed, but we cannot keep it for long. That is the issue we should resolute."

Nobuteru Tanuguchi: "It was a very eventful race. I drove with different driving styles according to the situation. Sometimes the rain eased off, and I noticed that the amount of rain varied depending on the location in the circuit. "

Round 3 of the 2004 AUTOBACS JGTC will be held at Sepang International Circuit on June 18 and 19.