2018.08.05

Round 5 Fuji : GTA Regular Press Conference

Round 5 at Fuji Speedway: GTA Regular Press Conference

Again this year, the promoter of SUPER GT, the GTA Co., Ltd is holding regularly scheduled press conferences for each of the SUPER GT races held in Japan this season. In these conferences, GTA answers representative questions from the Japan Motorsport-Journalist Society (JMS) and questions from the assembled journalists. In the conference held on Aug. 5th before the Round 5 race of the SUPER GT series, questions were asked about the CLASS 1 regulation and GTA Chairman Masaaki Bandoh answered as follows:

 

 

 

“The CLASS 1 regulation has at last been finalized and an agreement has been made to use this regulation in the ITR, Europe and Asia. Under the agreement, ITR is granted the intellectual property rights for the CLASS 1 regulation in Europe and the GTA has the same rights in Asia, both on a semi-permanent basis.

“Also, the plan is to use the CLASS 1 regulation until the year 2030. In other words, it is possible that races will be held under this regulation until 2030. By doing this, it means that the teams can approach manufacturers and tire makers with the possibility of long-term sponsorships involving developmental programs and the like. This possibility of mid- to long-term management policies and team plans is another benefit of adopting the CLASS 1 regulation.

“The use of the CLASS 1 regulation will begin from jointly organized race events in 2019. And due to the difference in aerodynamics and engine regulations between the SUPER GT and DTM cars, we believe the use of a CLASS 1＋α regulation for balance of performance (BoP) between the cars will be necessary.

“We are now involved in negotiations aimed at having all cars from both competitions conform to the CLASS 1 regulation by 2020. The basic plan is to have two or three of these joint events from 2020 onward, and from 2025, plans call for the number of joint events to be increased, with the current vision calling for two events to be held in Europe, two in Asia and two in the United States.

“To enable this, we want to create a schedule and a viable environment in which the SUPER GT series is completed between the months of March or April to October and then have the months of November to February open for scheduling of the CLASS 1 joint events. We believe that if we basically have one event in Germany and one event in Japan to begin with and then add another event each in other venues in Europe and Asia, it will naturally lead to increasing participation by the car manufacturers.

“The joint CLASS 1 press conference held during the DTM Norisring Race in June was attended by over 40 members of the press/media, and it was evident that there is even more enthusiastic response concerning its developments in Europe than there currently is in Japan. And I believe that there was an expression of approval for the fact that the CLASS 1 will be used until 2030 and that both the ITR and GTA will have intellectual property rights for their respective regions. In this sense, I believe that there is plenty of expectation for the coming joint race events.”

 

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