The FUJI GT 500km RACE, Round 2 of the 2014 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series, took place on the afternoon of May 4th at Fuji Speedway (Shizuoka Pref). The GT500 class winner was the No. 12 CALSONIC IMPUL GT-R driven by Hironobu Yasuda and Joao Paulo Lima de Oliveira. In the GT300 class, the win went to the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU Z4 driven by Nobuteru Taniguchi and Tatsuya Kataoka.
First pit stop timing sets the stage for victory
The GT300 pole-sitting No. 3 B-MAX NDDP GT-R (Kazuki Hoshino) got a good start to take the early lead. Meanwhile, the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Kota Sasaki) starting from 2nd position on the grid was passed by the No. 30 IWASAKI apr GT-R (Yuki Iwasaki) on the first lap and continued to drop back through the field. Then a big accident occurred on the 5th lap. Near the end of the main straight, the No. 88 MANEPA LAMBORGHINI GT3 (Takayuki Aoki) lightly bumped the car in front of it, but the reaction was enough to send No. 88 crashing into the guard rail on the out side of the turn and damage its nose section. This brought out the Safety Car to slow the race. Fortunately, the driver Aoki was not injured. After the race was restarted, the No. 31 OGT Panasonic PRIUS (Koki Saga) that had started the race from 7th-position on the grid began moving up at a fast pace and finally managed to pass car No. 3 on the 16th lap to take the lead.However, shortly after that a GT500 car caught fire and was brought to a stop at trackside. This brought out the Safety Car again. For the cars of the GT300 class, this presented the option of making an early routine pit stop, and as soon as the pit lane was opened, the 2nd-place No. 3 B-MAX NDDP GT-R, the No. 7 Studie BMW Z4 (Jorg Muller), the No. 11 GAINER DIXCEL SLS (Bjorn Wirdheim), No. 0 MUGEN CR-Z GT (Yuhki Nakayama) and the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKUZ4 (Tatsuya Kataoka) all opted for a pit stop in succession.
When the race was restarted on the 21st lap, car No. 31 assumed the lead, followed by the No. 2 SYNTIUM Apple MP4-12C (Hiroki Katoh), car No. 30 and the No. 86 CrystalCroco LAMBORGHINI GT3 (Shinya Hosokawa), all of which had chosen not to make an early pit stop.Perhaps due to the fact that the track surface temperature rose to above 30 degrees C. this day, the pace of the cars that took the lead would begin to slow. Car No. 31 was no exception to this trend, and as its pace worsened it was passed by car No. 2. As usual, the strategy for the No. 2 team was to have their ace driver Katoh build up a margin of lead, and in fact, he was able to extend the lead to six seconds before the first routine pit stop. However, in the middle stages of the race, the second stint driver Kazuho Takahashi had a costly collision with car No. 31 (Morio Nitta) in the Dunlop Corner. Both car No. 2 and car No. 31 were able to restart, but both were not out of contention for the lead.When car No. 2 made its first routine pit stop, car No. 3 (Lucas Ordonez) found itself back in the lead. About four seconds behind came car No. 11 (Bjorn Wirdheim), car No. 4 (Nobuteru Taniguchi) and the No. 0 MUGEN CR-Z GT (Tomoki Nojiri) giving chase.
The latter stages bring a fierce battle between the BMW Z4 and the Benz SLS
When this group that had opted for an early first pit stop now took their second routine stop, cars No. 31 and No. 2 ran at the front for a while in 1st and 2nd places. But, this would only be temporary. When it came time for these two to make their second pit stop, it was car No. 0 (Yuhki Nakayama) that assumed the lead. Apparently, the advantage of the hybrid's good fuel economy had shortening the time in the pit needed for refueling. What's more, car No. 0 was entering the last stages of the race with a more than 5-sec. lead over the car in 2nd place. Meanwhile, instead of being free to chase the leader, car No. 4 (Tatsuya Kataoka) was locked in a side-by-side battle with car No. 11 (Wirdheim). With 25 laps remaining in the race, it looked as if the MUGEN CR-Z GT was headed for victory.However, as the end of the race grew nearer, Nakayama often had to struggle to keep car No. 0 under control in the turns. With 10 laps remaining in the race the No.0 car's lead had dwindled down to less than three seconds. Because of the length of the stint, the condition of the tire had worsened considerably. Then tragedy struck as the No. 0 car made a costly spin-out on the Dunlop Corner with six laps remaining. It was enough to let car No. 4 and No. 11 go charging past. This put Kataoka in car No. 4 in the lead. Chasing him in car No. 11, Wirdheim was able to use his roughly 6 km/h advantage in top speed over the BMW Z4 to attempt to pass No. 4 in the first turn after the straight, but each time Kataoka made skillful use of his braking and blocking to hold his lead.The two machines thus stayed locked nose-to-tail with no change in position all the way to the checkered. This gave the No. 4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKUZ4 its second consecutive victory in the opening rounds of the series. Finishing 2nd was the No. 11 GAINER DIXCEL SLS, which had suffered transmission trouble in the qualifying that left it in 13th position on the starting grid but fought back aggressively to the finish, even after attempting a fruitless pass on one of the GT500 machines that cause it to spin out and upset the machine's balance. Finishing 3rd was the No. 0 MUGEN CR-Z GT.
