On May 3rd, Round 2 of the 2026 AUTOBACS series, the “FUJI 3 Hours Race GW Special” was held at Fuji Speedway in Shizuoka Prefecture (1 lap 4,563m). As in years past, this round was held during the Golden Week holidays and attracted large crowds of spectators. This Qualifying day began in an intense atmosphere. In the GT500 class, amidst fierce competition in Q1 and Q2 by the GR Supra GT500, the pole position went to Fukuzumi driving the No. 14 ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra (Nirei Fukuzumi / Kazuya Oshima). In the GT300 class, it was Yamauchi driving the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi / Hideki Yamauchi) powered by a new engine who set a new course record in the Qualifying to finish in 1st place. These two teams will start the race on May 4th from the front of their respective starting grids.
□The Official Qualifying weather: Q1/Q2: cloudy | Track: dry | Air temperature/Track temperature GT300 Q1 at the start: 21℃/27℃, Q1 at the end: 20℃/26℃, GT300 Q2 at the start: 19℃/25℃, Q2 at the end: 19℃/25℃.
In the morning the skies over Fuji Speedway were clear, but after the start of the Official Practice the skies became cloudy around the time of the Pit Walk session and strong winds began to blow. It was under these conditions that the Official Qualifying started at 2:20 pm.
There were 15 cars running in Q1 of the GT300 Group A. The first to record a fast time of 1’35.285 was the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi) that had also run the fastest time in the morning official practice sessions, and it advanced to Q2 with the Top Time. Following it came the No. 31 apr LC500h GT（Miki Koyama） and the No. 11 GAINER TANAX Z (Ryuichiro Tomita) in 2nd and 3rd positions respectively.
On the other hand, the No. 9 PACIFIC UMA MUSUME NAC BMW (Yusuke Tomibayashi) that is competing this season with the BMW M4 GT3, the Kenko K’s Frontier WM NILZZ GT-R (Daiki Fujiwara) and the No. 6 UNI-ROBO BLUEGRASS FERRARI (Niklas Krütten) that had won a dramatic come-from-behind victory in Round 2 at Fuji were unfortunately unable to progress to Q2.
As for the Q1 Group B, it was competed by 14 cars. The competition in this group was more intense than in Group A, and here again the cars improved on their best times as the session progressed. The No. 60 Syntium LMcorsa LC500 GT (Shunsuke Kohno) recorded the best time of 1’35.525 to progress to Q2. Following in 2nd position with a time of 1’35.711 was the No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R (Iori Kimura). Third position went to the No. 52 Green Brave GR Supra GT (Hiroki Yoshida) with a time of 1’35.866.
The cars finishing behind the No. 30 apr GR86 GT (Manabu Orido) that managed to finish in 9th position by a slim margin of just 0.042 sec. were unable to progress to Q2.
When Q2 started at 3:13 after the finish of the GT500 class Q1, the scattered showers falling around the track led to a declaration of the track condition as Wet. Nonetheless, most of the 18 cars competing in Q2 took to the track with slick tires. With one minute remaining before the final waving of the checkered flag, the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Hideki Yamauchi) bettered the course record of 1’34.395 it had set in 2021 with a new record time of 1’34.314 to take the lead.
Despite the other cars’ efforts to beat this target time, none were able to get close to No. 61’s time. As a result, with a lead of 0.748 sec. over 2nd place, the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi / Hideki Yamauchi) won an impressive pole position. For both Yamauchi and the BRZ team this was their first pole position since the final round of last season at Motegi, and with it Yamauchi extended his own career record of most pole positions to 17.
Following in 2nd place came the No. 31 apr LC500h GT (Kazuto Kotaka). Securing 3rd place with a time of 1’35.255 at the end of the Q2 session was the No. 52 Green Brave GR Supra GT (Seita Nonaka).
