The 2026 AUTOBACS SUPER GT Round 7, the “AUTOPOLIS GT 3Hours RACE” took place on October 18th (Sun.) at AUTOPOLIS (one lap 4,674m x 3 hours race) in Oita Prefecture. Blessed with fair autumn skies, AUTOPOLIS saw three hours of intense racing. In it, the GT500 class race saw the No. 100 STANLEY HRC PRELUDE-GT (Naoki Yamamoto / Tadasuke Makino) take its second win of the season following the one in Round 4 at Fuji. Also, the two No. 100 car drivers returned to 2nd place in the Drivers’ Ranking, and in the final race of the series at Motegi they will face the 3-time champions, the No. 36 au TOM’S GR Supra. In the GT300 class the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Morio Nitta / Shinichi Takagi) ran a skillful race from a start in 7th position on the grid to enable Nitta to extend his career record for most victories to 23.

As with the official qualifying on the previous day, the race was held under clear autumn skies and conditions with the air temperature at 25℃ and the track surface temperature at 33℃, starting at 1:10 in the afternoon with a parade lap led by 5 police motorcycles and 4 police cars of the Oita Prefectural Police, with the race beginning at 1:16 in the afternoon.

In the GT300 class race the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi / Hideki Yamauchi) starting from pole position came through the first corner in the lead. In 2nd position came the No. 52 Green Brave GR Supra GT (Hiroki Yoshida / Seita Nonaka) and in 3rd position emerged the No. 2 HYPER WATER INGING GR86 GT (Yuui Tsutsumi / Kazuhisa Urabe). In the early stages of the race these three cars battled at close quarters, and despite the arrival of the GT500 cars from part way through the race, a fierce battle continued between the three. In this, it was the No. 2 GR86 that on the 13th lap passed the No. 52 GR Supra to move up into 2nd position. Car No. 2 continued its strong momentum to then pass the No. 61 BRZ on the second hairpin turn of the 17th lap to take the lead. Meanwhile, No. 61 was also passed by car No. 52 on the next lap to drop into 3rd position.

However, this Round 7 is a 3hours race. And since it included two mandatory pit stops, each team brought their own different strategies to meet the requirements. In the early stages of the race the No. 5 MACHSYAKEN AIR BUSTER MC86 MACH GO (Yusuke Shiotsu / Souta Arao) and the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG (Nobuteru Taniguchi / Tatsuya Kataoka) in the rear pack made their pit stops on the 7th and 8th laps and employed strategies including only refueling.

As these early stages came to an end on the 22nd lap, Koyama in the No. 31 apr LC500h GT (Kazuto Kodaka / Miki Koyama / Charlie Wurz) that had started from 13th position on the grid was moving up. But an accident occurred at the corner after the Sayorin Bridge when its right front tire came off and the car ran off the course. This caused the Safety Car (SC) to be brought out. When the SC withdrew from the course on the 28th lap, the GT300 teams returned to their pits one after another. On the 34th lap, the No. 60LC500 running in 4th position, and on the 36th lap the leading No. 2 GR86 returned to their pits. Furthermore, on the 41st lap the No. 52 GR Supra made its first pit stop, and here it opted to employ a no-tire-change strategy.

In the middle stages of the race, the order in the lead group saw the No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R (Joao Paulo de Oliveira / Iori Kimura) that had delayed its first pit stop in the lead, followed by teams that had made their pit stops in the early stages, including the No. 777 D’station Vantage GT3 (Tomonobu Fujii / Charlie Fagg) that had made its pit stop in the early stages, the No. 5 MC86, and the No. 32 ENEOS X PRIME AMG GT3 (Hiroaki Ishiura / Tokiya Suzuki). Behind these teams came the No. 52 GR Supra, while the No. 2 GR86 also came forward and battled again for position. But on the 47th lap when the GT500 class cars joined in the battle it cause car No. 52 to run up on a corner curb stone, and then to lose control and run off the track. When this happened, it hit the righthand wall and damaged the car. This caused the start of the second SC run of the day.

The race restarted when the GT500 class entered its 56th lap. Due to the timing of the pit stops before and after this, and the difference in refueling volumes, the race order changed dramatically. In the second half of the race the lead went to the No. 360 RUNUP SOL GT-R (Rin Arakawa / Yu Kanamaru / Atsushi Tanaka) that had held off on its pit stop until just before the second SC run and then conducted its second course of pit work just after the SC withdrew.

However, a car that had pursued almost the same strategy was the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Morio Nitta / Shinichi Takagi) that had started the race from 7th position on the grid. First of all its driver Nitta had taken the initiative to carefully control the fuel level and position in the race and made his pit stop on the 40th lap. There they changed drivers to Takagi, changed tires and took the tentative lead. Then, while making short lap corners, he made his second pit stop on the 64th lap. By employing a no-tire-change strategy he succeeded in returning to the race in 2nd place behind car No. 360. At that time, the pace of the No. 96 RC F driver Takagi was very fast, enabling him to catch up with No. 360 in three laps and pass it. With this, he has effectively reclaimed the top spot.

From there, the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Morio Nitta/ Shinichi Takagi) continued to pull away from the pack and go on to take its first win of the season. For the team and for Nitta it was their first win since the one at Rd. 3 at SUZUKA in 2019, and for Nitta it extended his career record of wins in the class to 23. For Takagi it was also his first win since Rd. 7 at SUGO in 2019, and it extended his record of career wins to 22 (2nd position).

Although it was the No. 666 seven x seven PORSCHE GT3R EVO (Sven Muller / Taichi Watarai) that crossed the finish line in 2nd place, a penalty of 100 seconds was added to its time for a “Lack of mandatory pit in penalty”, which dropped it to 11th place. With this the No. 360 RUNUP × SOL GT-R (Rin Arakawa / Yu Kanamaru / Atsushi Tanaka) was moved up to 2nd place. Also, the No. 88 VENTENY Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure / Daniil Kvyat / Natsuki Sakaguchi) that crossed the goal line in the 4th place received a 100 second penalty for “Driver change due to a pit in during the SC” that dropped it to 12th place, while 3rd place went to the No. 65 LEON PYRAMID AMG (Naoya Gamou / Togo Suganami / Haruki Kurosawa).

As for the competition for series points, the No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R (Joao Paulo de Oliveira / Iori Kimura) won 2 points for finishing in 14th position, which enabled it to maintain its lead in series points. What’s more, O’Sullivan of the No. 7 CARGUY Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO (Zak O’Sullivan / Kiyoshi Umegaki/ Reimei Ito) that finished this race in 7th place moved up to 2nd place in the standing, while the No. 65 driver pair of Gamou and Suganami moved up to within 18 points of No. 56, the position from which it will compete in the final round at Motegi.