The first Official test of the 2026 AUTOBACS SUPER GT got underway on March 6th. Held at Okayama International Circuit, which will be the site of the opening round of the 2026 series, In the GT500 class, 14 cars competed, while the GT300 class brought together 28 cars. In a total of 4 hours of running time in the morning and afternoon sessions, the GT500 class saw the au TOM’S GR Supra（Sho Tsuboi / Kenta Yamashita）score the top time, while in the GT300 class fastest time went to the Syntium LMcorsa LC500 GT（Hiroki Yoshimoto / Shunsuke Kohno）.
◎Session 1: morning of the first day 9:30 – 11:30 Weather: Cloudy / Track: Dry Air temperature:9℃ – 12℃ / Track surface temperature: 12℃ – 17℃
◎Session 2: afternoon of the first day 14:00 – 16:11 (11 minutes added due to red flag interruption, last 10 min. class separate) Weather: Cloudy / Track: Dry Air temperature:11℃ – 10℃ / Track surface temperature: 15℃ – 13℃
■Under cloudy skies in the morning session, the two GR Supra cars, namely the au TOM’S GR Supra and the KeePer CERUMO GR Supra finished 1st and 2nd
In Official Test Okayama Day 1, in the morning session the air temperature failed to reach 10℃, making it cool enough to feel that spring was still far from arriving. While at times the clouds became thinner and the sun could be felt, throughout the day the sessions were run in cool weather. These test sessions were competed by 14 cars in the GT500 class, while the GT300 class originally had 29 entries, the fact that the No.11 GAINER TANAX Z（Ryuichiro Tomita / Kazuki Oki） failed to complete its new car for this season in time, it had to withdraw. Also, while in previous years the tests were competed on Saturday and Sunday, due to the scheduling this time, they were competed with Day 1 on Friday and Day 2 on Saturday, and on this day (Friday) the Tests were not open to the spectators.
When the morning session began at 9:30 (Day 1), the cars went out on the track all at once. As the session entered its 18th minute, Shiotsu driving the No. 5 MACHSYAKEN AIR BUSTER MC86 MACH GO（Yusuke Shiotsu / Souta Arao） came to a stop on the back straight, which brought out the Red Flag to stop the session, that was the only accident that would interrupt the session, and otherwise the cars continued to put in their laps.
Showing its speed from the early stages were the TOYOTA GR Supra cars, the previous year’s Champion No. 36 au TOM’S GR Supra and the No. 38 KeePer CERUMO GR Supra (Toshiki Oyu / Rikuto Kobayashi）. They were followed by two cars that had switched to Bridgestone tire for this season, the No. 24 REALIZE CORPORATION Z （Teppei Natori / Atsushi Miyake） and the No. 100 STANLEY HRC PRELUDE -GT（Naoki Yamamoto / Tadasuke Makino）.
In the middle stages of the session, the Nissan Z cars, namely the No. 12 TRS IMPUL with SDG Z（Kazuki Hiramine / Bertrand Baguette） and the MOTUL Niterra Z（Katsumasa Chiyo / Mitsunori Takaboshi） also improved on their times to close in on the lead group, but the top two remained the same until the end. The top time went to Tsuboi in the No. 36 GT Supra for the first time in the Official Tests. Finishing the session in 3rd position came the No. 12 Z, while a fast lap by the rookie Nomura in the No. 17 Astemo HRC PRELUDE -GT（Koudai Tsukakoshi /Yuto Nomura） put it in 5th position as the fastest among the Honda HRC PRELUDE -GT cars.
When Session 1 ended, the track was turned over to the 15-minute FCY Test. Which ended the morning session.
■au TOM’S GR Supra records the top time in the afternoon session. Yamashita turns in a time of the same level.
After a 2-hour interval, Session 2 began at 2:00 PM. Compared to the morning session, the cloud cover overhear grew heavier, making for a more chilling cold. While the weather report also predicted the rain might start to fall at the end of the session, fortunately the rain never came, and the track condition remained dry until the end. While the No. 36 au TOM’S GR Supra also ran fast times in this session, it was the No. 39 DENSO KOBELCO SARD GR Supra （Yuhi Sekiguchi / Sacha Fenestraz） that continued to hold the fastest time into the middle stages. Following the two GT Supra cars came the No. 100 STANLEY HRC PRELUDE -GT and the No. 16 #16 ARTA MUGEN HRC PRELUDE -GT（Tomoki Nojiri / Ren Sato）.
Although there was scheduled to be a 10-minute exclusive running time for each class, but just before the session began, the No. 52 Green Brave GR Supra GT（Hiroki Yoshida / Seita Nonaka） ran off the track to the out-side at the last corner and came to a stop in the gravel. This brought out the second Red Flag of the day to stop the session. With its tires sunk in the gravel up to half their height, it took more time than usual to recover the car No. 52, causing the session to finally be restarted at 3:51.
This extended the overall schedule for the session by about 10 minutes. And while there was still fear of rain near the end of the session, but fortunately it didn’t begin to fall until after the session ended. Thus the track condition remained dry until the end.
In the exclusive session for the GT500 class, Fenestraz in the No. 39 GT Supra, Sasahara in the No. 37 Deloitte TOM’S GR Supra（Ukyo Sasahara / Giuliano Alesi） and Kobayashi in the No. 38 GR Supra continued to better the team’s fastest times, it was Yamashita in the No. 36 GT Supra that suddenly dropped his time to 1’17.493 sec. Although it did not beat Tsuboi’s time from the morning session, it gave the No. 36 car the top time for both sessions to end the Day 1 sessions.
■In the GT300 exclusive session, rookie drivers performed well, giving the Syntium LMcorsa LC500 GT the top time in the morning session
In the GT300 class the time of 1’24.919 recorded by in the morning session by the No. 60 Syntium LMcorsa LC500 G became the top time of Day 1. It was the time run by Yoshimoto, who had been at the wheel for most of Session 1. While he spent most of the afternoon session troubleshooting in the pit, but in the second half he managed to get out on the track and completed 30 laps (15th).
In the afternoon, it was Tomibayashi in the No. 9 PACIFIC Umamusumei NAC BMW （Yusuke Tomibayashi / Yuta Fujiwara / Ryohei Sakaguchi） who recorded the top time. In the exclusive GT300 session in it was mostly rookie drivers who were at the wheel, it was Kvyat in the No. 88 VENTENY Lamborghini GT3 （Takashi Kogure / Daniil Kvyat）, Suzuki in the No. 32 ENEOS X PRIME AMG GT3（Hiroaki Ishiura / Tokiya Suzuki） and Shimbara in the No.18 UPGARAGE AMG GT3（Takashi Kobayashi / Kotaro Shimbara）who scored the best times for their respective teams. Among these it was the No. 32 AMG GT3 that scored his team’s top time, but it wasn’t fast enough to beat the time of Tomibayashi in the No. 9 M4 GT3.
By the way, in the morning session the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG （Nobuteru Taniguchi / Tatsuya Kataoka） developed electronic trouble and was unable to run. In the afternoon session it was able to get out on the track, but due to the large number of problems that were found after having changed to a new chassis the team adopted at the end of February, causing it to have to spend a lot of time in the pit. Also, the No. 20 HOPPY Schatz GR Supra GT （Takamitsu Matsui / Ryota Horachi） which had been successfully running tests for nearly 50 laps in the morning session also developed drive train trouble that forced it to end its runs. According to the driver Matsui. “Since it looks like we will be able to run in dry track conditions tomorrow, rather than rushing to do more work on it slowly today.” Thus, making it appear that the trouble was not serious. This season we have also changed the aerodynamics, and it feels as if we will be able to start high a higher base line. However, we still have a way to go before we can run with the leaders. Since this morning, we have been able to try a lot in the setup, I want to see us running well tomorrow morning.”
■GT500 Class – Day 1 Overall Top Time
Sho Tsuboi （No. 36 au TOM’S GR Supra）
“We also did tests here at Okayama in February, but since at that time it was only tests for the GT500 class, but the conditions certainly become different when we are running together with the GT300 class, and the atmosphere also felt different. We got the top time while running together with the GT300 class this time, and it came at an ideal time when we had a clear lap just as the tires were getting into top condition. Since it was a time run in such conditions, I still think there is room for improvement, and I feel that is a good thing. As for Yamashita’s time in the afternoon as well, we still had a big margin of lead over the second-best time, so that (advantage) was also good. Since there are still a lot of things we won’t know about when it comes to the real thing (the opening round), but there is confidence that comes from knowing that are performing well among the GR Supra teams.”
■GT300 Class – Day 1 Overall Top Time
Hiroki Yoshimoto （No. 60 Syntium LMcorsa LC500 GT）
“In the GTE Tests (*) before the Official Tests at Okayama, Kono-san did a lot of running and was able to verify a number of things. Since for me, the final round at Motegi last season had been my first drive in four months, it worked out well that Kono-san had been continuing the testing and the machine’s performance was so good that I felt good driving it. Although we had transmission trouble in Session 1, since everyone on the team had been able to work smoothly, we were able to run in the last hour. Because our car had been virtually new in last year’s tests at Okayama, its setup was far from satisfying. Although a lot improved as we competed that season, and it came to feel better than ever. Last season we were able to get one win, but besides that our record was not good at all. I hope that this season we will be able to perform well in every race.” (*) Joint tests held by GT Entrant Association（GTE） at Fuji Speedway on February 18th
