Round 2 Fuji Speedway : Qualifying GT300

The Official Qualifying for the FUJI GT 3 Hours RACE, Round 2 of the 2024 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series, took place on May 3rd (Friday/national holiday) at Fuji Speedway (one lap 4,563 m) in Shizuoka Prefecture. In fine weather with a clear view of Mt. Fuji, the GT500 class Pole Position was won by the No. 17 Astemo CIVIC TYPE R-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi/Kakunoshin Ohta), giving the CIVIC TYPE R-GT that debuted this season its first pole position. The GT300 class pole was taken by the No. 88 JLOC Lamborghini GT3, and for the drivers Takashi Kogure and Yuya Motojima it was their rewarding first pole in the class. These two cars will start from the front of their respective class grids in tomorrow’s race on May 4th.

On a pleasant day blessed with clear skies, many fans turned out from morning for Qualifying day of the Round 2 of the SUPER GT series. The Official Qualifying started at 2:25 in the afternoon with the Q1 sessions run in two separate groups, A and B. As a result of a lottery drawing held at the winners’ press conference at the previous round, Group B would run first, and its 13 cars took to the track.

The first to post a leading lap time of 1’36.719 was the pole sitter of the opening round of the series, the No. 65 LEON PYRAMID AMG (Takuro Shinohara). This became the target as the other cars ran their time attacks, and it was the No. 88 JLOC Lamborghini GT3 (Yuya Motojima), which had been 2nd in the morning’s Official Practice that now claimed the top spot with a lap of 1’36.084. With no other car in the group able to beat this time by No. 88, it became the Q1 Group B’s top time. Car No. 65 finished the session in 2nd position. Then it was the No. 18 UPGARAGE NSX GT3 (Takashi Kobayashi) that moved into 3rd position with a time of 1’36.942 in the Checkered Flag lap, but at the very last moment the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Morio Nitta) moved up to take 3rd position with a time of 1’36.845.

　 Next, it was time for the 14 cars of Group A to run. The No. 11 GAINER TANAX Z (Ryuichiro Tomita) that had been unable to run in the morning’s Official Practice was able to make works in time to run for the first time this season. It was here that the No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R (Joao Paulo de Oliveira) ran a time of 1’36.166 in the Checkered Flag lap and appeared to have claimed the top spot in the Group A session. However, the last car to cross the control line, the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG (Tatsuya Kataoka), recorded a time of 1’36.156 to beat the time of No. 56 and claim the top spot. The 3rd position went to the winner of Round 1 of the season, the No. 2 muta Racing GR86 GT (Hibiki Taira), with a time of 1’36.450. As for the No. 11 GAINER TANAX Z, which had drawn the attention of the fans in its first run of the season, it eventually finished the session in 4th position with a time of 1’36.484.

　After the end of the GT500 class Q1, Group 2 of the GT300 class Q2 began its session at 3:18 in the afternoon. This session was run by the 11 cars that had finished below 9th position in Q1. Although this was the bottom group in the qualifying, according to the Switch Rule, the cars that finished in the top four places here would be switched to run in front of the bottom four cars from Group 1.
It was here that car No. 777 D'station Vantage GT3 (Charles Fagg) ran the fastest time of any car in both Q1 groups with a lap of 1’35.835. Running in Q2 to determine the combined time with Q1 was Jin Nakamura in the No. 31 apr LC500h GT, whose lap time gave the team the fastest combined time by running a time of 3’13.313. The second fasted combined time was that of the No. 9 PACIFIC VSPO NAC AMG (Yusuke Tomibayashi).

The next to run in the GT300 class Q2 was Group 1, consisting of the top 16 cars from Q1. In the final stages of the session, a fierce competition developed between cars driven by some of the fastest drivers in the qualifying, the No. 65 LEON PYRAMID AMG (Naoya Gamou), the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Hideki Yamauchi) and the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Shinichi Takagi). Then it was the No. 88 JLOC Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure) that brought its best time down to 1’36.066. When combined with the time of Motojima in Q1, this gave the team a combined time of 3’12.150 and pole position for Round 2 of the series here at Fuji. For Motojima, it was his first pole position, and for Kogure, who had already proved his speed in the GT500 class, this was also his first pole position in the GT300 class.

　 Finishing 2nd in the qualifying was the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG, whose driver in Q2, Nobuteru Taniguchi, came home with a time of 1’36.476. Finishing 3rd was the No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R, whose Q2 driver, Daiki Sasaki, recorded a time of 1’36.548.

Also, from Group 2, the 13th and 14th position qualifiers, namely the No. 31 apr LC500h GT and the No. 9 PACIFIC VSPO NAC AMG, and the 15th position No. 87 METALIVE S Lamborghini GT3, were able to surpass the bottom finishers of Group 1.