The official qualifying session for the “MOTEGI GT 250km RACE”, Round 3 of the 2026 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series, took place on the morning of Saturday, November 7th, at Mobility Resort Motegi (one lap: 4.801 km) in Tochigi Prefecture. In the GT500 class, Riki Okusa, driving the No. 64 Modulo HRC PRELUDE-GT (Riki Okusa / Igor Omura Fraga), took pole position, which is his third consecutive pole. In the GT300 class, Ryuichiro Tomita, driving the No. 11 GAINER TANAX Z (Ryuichiro Tomita / Kazuki Oki), took the top spot; this marks the first GT300 class pole position for both Tomita himself and for the Fairlady Z model developed by the team. Both of these teams will start at the front of their respective class grids for the final race, which begins today, November 7th, at 2:00 PM.
□Official Qualifying Weather: clear | Track: dry | Air temperature/Track temperature at the start of the GT300 class qualifying: 15℃/18℃, at the start of the GT500 class qualifying: 21℃/19℃, at the end: 17℃/22℃.
Regrettably, it has been announced that the No. 52 Green Brave GR Supra GT (driven by Hiroki Yoshida and Seita Nonaka) will miss both rounds at Motegi. The car sustained severe damage in an accident during the previous round at Autopolis – following an earlier incident in Round 5 at Suzuka – and the team has decided to withdraw from the final event at Motegi, in order to prioritize safety above all else.
Round 3 is held as a one-day event, featuring a single 20-minute qualifying session that began at 9:00 a.m. In the GT300 class, each of the 28 participating entries designated one driver to take part in the session at Motegi, which unfolded under bright, clear blue skies.
In the early stages of the session, while the track remained relatively clear of traffic, the No. 32 ENEOS X PRIME GR GT3 concept car, entered as a specially approved vehicle and driven by Hiroaki Ishiura, completed a vigorous series of laps. Meanwhile, the No. 22 RQ’s AMG GT3, with qualifying duties handled by driver Masaki Jyonai, who has announced that this third round will be his final race in SUPER GT, was the only other entry to make a qualifying attempt. Although the No. 32 car concluded its run early, its time of 1’48.105 served as the benchmark for the other competitors as they would undertake their own timed laps.
Most of the cars remained in the pits until about 10 minutes remained in the session, after which they headed out onto the track one after another. With less than two minutes remaining they began to record a succession of lap times in the 1 minute 46 second to 47 second range.
With about one minute remaining in the session, Ryuichiro Tomita, driving the No. 11 GAINER TANAX Z, clocked a lap time of 1’45.418, which went unchallenged for the remainder of the session. This secured the first-ever pole position for the Nissan Fairlady Z, which was developed by GAINER to meet GTA-GT300 specifications and has been competing since the second round of the 2024 season. Upon stepping out of the car, Tomita, who played a key role in the development of both the vehicle and its Dunlop tires, was moved to tears by this achievement.
Taking the second spot was the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Shinichi Takagi), a car whose co-driver, Morio Nitta, who will be competing in the final race of his SUPER GT career at the coming Round 8. In third place came the No. 88 VENTENY Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure), a driver who excels at Motegi. Following in fourth position was the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Hideki Yamauchi), while the No. 31 apr LC500h GT (Kazuto Kotaka) finished in fifth position.
The No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R (Joao Paulo de Oliveira), which currently leads the driver standings, will start Round 3 from 16th position on the grid. The No. 65 LEON PYRAMID AMG (Naoya Gamou/Togo Suganami), currently third in the standings, qualified 22nd, while the No. 7 CARGUY Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO (Ritomo Miyata/Kiyoshi Umegaki), which sits fourth in the standings, secured the 9th starting grid position thanks to Miyata’s performance in the qualifying.
