2008 SUPER GT Round7

Weather:Fine | Course:Dry | Air Temp. 31°C | track surface Temp. 43°C

The race began at 14:00. After all the machines took their positions on the grid and moved out for the formation lap, the No. 100 RAYBRIG NSX (Yuji Ide) in 12th position on the grid was unable to start and had to be pushed back to the pit. There, a problem was found in the starter motor, and after repairs the car was able to join the race two laps late.
In the lead at the end of the first lap was the pole sitter, the No. 3 YellowHat YMS TOMICA GT-R (Ronnie Quintarelli), followed by the No.1 ARTA NSX (Ralph Firman) in 2nd and the other leaders behind them in the grid starting order. In the middle of the pack, however, there were some changes in the order. The No. 12 CALSONIC IMPUL GT-R (Tsugio Matsuda) had moved up and the No. 38 ZENT CERUMO SC430 (Yuji Tachikawa) had spun out at the 5th corner. The No. 22 MOTUL AUTECH GT-R (Michael Krumm) had also lost a lot of ground by the end of lap one. There seemed to have been contact between No. 22 and No. 38, for which No. 22 was later given a drive-trough penalty.

On lap 17, Matsuda suddenly brought his No.12 machine into the pit while running in about 6th position. It looked like machine trouble at first, but he quickly returned to the track after no more than a change of tires and refueling. Apparently, the team's strategy had been to try to move up among the leaders by starting with only a partial tank of fuel and making two pit stops.
Among the other teams, there were also rather early pit stops made by the No. 24 WOODONE ADVAN Clarion GT-R (Joao Paulo Lima De Oliveira > Seiji Ara) at the end of lap 21 and the No. 23 XANAVI NISMO GT-R (Benoit Treluyer > Satoshi Motoyama) and the No. 35 houzan KFAFT SC430 (Tatsuya Kataoka > Peter Dumbreck) at the end of lap 26. It seems that the higher than expected track surface temperature was causing the tires on some of the machines to wear down faster than anticipated.

No.1 ARTA NSX
Between the top two machines, it was No. 1 that pulled into the pit first at the end of lap 28. The team shortened the pit work time by changing only the rear tires and returning to the track quickly with Takuya Izawa now in the driver's seat. No. 3 made its pit stop at the end of the next lap and changed drivers to Naoki Yokomizo and replaced all four tires. Although this naturally caused a longer pit stop, the difference was not as much as expected and Yokomizo was able to get back into the race still in the lead without having No. 1 on his tail.
After that, when all the teams had finished their pit stops, including the second pit stop of No. 12 (Matsuda > Sebastien Philippe), about two-thirds of the race was over, with the leaders now in the 40th lap. At this point the order had returned to the same order as at the start, with No. 3 in the lead, No. 1 in 2nd and the No .6 ENEOS SC430 (Bjorn Wirdheim > Akira Iida) in 3rd.
Moving up into 4th position behind the three leaders at this stage was the No. 36 PETRONAS TOM'S SC430 (Andre Lotterer > Juichi Wakisaka). There were intervals of a few seconds between each of the top three and No. 36 in 4th, and it look at this point as if the race would go on that way to the checkered. However, on the last lap the pace of car No. 6 suddenly slowed to the point where No. 36 easily passed it to move into 3rd position.

No.36 PETRONAS TOM'S SC430
The checkered waved at the end of lap 63 to end the race. The victory went to the No. 3 YellowHat YMS TOMICA GT-R (Ronnie Quintarelli/Naoki Yokomizo). For this team, it was the first victory since in the GT500 class since the 4th round of the 1995 series at Fuji Speedway (GT1 class at the time), back when the team's present manager, Masuhiro Hasemi was still a team driver.For both of the drivers this time, it was their first win in an official SUPER GT race.
Finishing 2nd came the No. 1 ARTA NSX (Ralph Firman/Takuya Izawa). Third place went to the No. 36 PETRONAS TOM'S SC430 (Juichi Wakisaka/Andre Lotterer), which meant that each of the three big domestic makers had one machine in the top three.
Behind the leaders there had been some big changes in the finishing order between 7th and 10th places on the final lap. Motoyama driving No. 23 in 9th position had a collision with another car that dropped him back to 12th position. Finishing 7th was No. 22 (Krumm > Masataka Yanagida), while the No. 18 TAKATA DOME NSX (Takashi Kogure > Ryo Michigami) finished 8th and No. 38 (Tachikawa > Richard Lyons) 9th.
Based on these results, the series ranking is led by the No. 36 team of Wakisaka/Lotterer and the No. 18 pain of Michigami/Kogure, who are tied for first in series. Third in the ranking is the No. 22 team of Krumm/Yanagida, while the No. 23 pair of Motoyama/Treluyer stands in 4th place.

The GT300 class race began with an upset when the engine of the No. 33 HANKOOK PORSCHE (Masami Kageyama) in 6th position on the grid failed to start immediately, dropping it to the very back of the field. Meanwhile, the pole-sitting No. 26 YUNKER POWER TAISAN PORSCHE (Nobuteru Taniguchi) and the other leaders came through the first lap in their grid order. On lap 4, however, the No. 62 WILLCOM ADVAN VEMAC408R (Haruki Kurosawa) spun out while running in 3rd position. This moved the No.77 CUSCO DUNLOP SUBARU IMPREZA (Kota Sasaki) into 3rd position and the No.110 KUMHO BOXSTER-GT (Hidetoshi Mitsusada) into 4th.
A battle for 3rd soon developed between these two cars and continued until No. 110 finally passed No. 77 on the third corner of lap 15. But later, on lap 28, No. 110 began to slow down suddenly. It then pulled into the pit on the next lap for its routine pit stop and a driver change to Daisuke Ikeda. In the process it lost position and allowed the No. 66 triple a MURCIE RG-1 (Koji Yamanishi) to move into 4th position.
After that, No. 26 (Taniguchi > Shinichi Yamaji), No. 77 (Sasaki > Tetsuya Yamaji) and No. 66 (Yamanishi > Atsushi Yogo) made their pit stops one after another. Among these, the pit work on No. 77 took an especially long time and caused the tam to lose considerable ground in the race order.

No.2 Privée KENZO Asset Shiden
Meanwhile, Katoh in the No. 2 Privée KENZO Asset Shiden held off on his pit stop as long as possible before bringing the car in for its pit work and handing the wheel over to teammate Kazuho Takahashi on lap 41. Takahashi returned to the track with the lead intact. At this point, Atsushi Yogo in No. 66 was running in 2nd and Shinichi Yamaji in No. 26 held 3rd place.
Behind them, though, two other teams had been driving hard working their way up rapidly through the field. One was the No. 19 WedsSport IS350 (Manabu Orido > Tsubasa Abe) and the other was No. 33 (Kageyama > Mitsuhiro Kinoshita), both of which had been forced to start the race at the back of the pack and had been passing the other cars at a pace of about one every two or three laps. When all the teams had completed their pit stops, No. 19 was now in 4th position and No. 33 was in 6th.
After that, No. 33 was unable to pick up the pace any further, but Abe in No. 19 continued the charge, passing Yamaji in No. 26 on the 90-degree corner of lap 44 to move into 3rd position. Two laps later Abe was putting the pressure on Yogo in car No. 66. After passing Yogo, Abe began to close the gap on the leader, Takahashi in car No. 2.

No.66 triple a MURCIE RG-1
Abe finally succeeded in passing the leader on the 90-degree corner of lap 52. After having started from the last position on the grid, No. 19 had finally succeeded in passing the entire field to take the lead.
There were no further changes in the order of the leaders before the checkered at the end of lap 63.
The winner was the No. 19 WedsSport IS350 (Manabu Orido / Tsubasa Abe). This is a team that had shown great speed until now but had been unable to turn that potential into solid results. In this fifth race since introducing the new IS350 machine, they finally succeeded in turning that potential into a hard-earned victory. In second came the No. 2 Shiden (Kazuho Takahashi/Hiroki Katoh), while 3rd place went to the No. 66 triple a MURCIE RG-1 (Koji Yamanishi/Atsushi Yogo).
In this race, the GT300 ranking leader, the No. 46 MOLA LEOPALACE Z team of Kazuki Hoshino/Hironobu Yasuda, finished 7th and the rankings 2nd place team, the No. 43 ARTA Garaiya (Morio Niita/Shinichi Takagi), finished 9th. As a result, there was no change in the top two position in the ranking but the No. 2 pair of Takahashi/Katoh moved up into 3rd place.