2019.03.31

[Official Tests at Fuji - Day 2] WAKO'S 4CR LC500 sets fastest time on last day. RUNUP RIVAUX GT-R fastest in GT300 Class

Official Tests at Fuji Speedway – March 31 (Sun.)

In a reversal of the cloudy skies of the day before, Day 2 of the Official Tests at Fuji saw fair weather. Due to the rain that fell during the night some sections of the track were still wet when the morning session started. By afternoon, however, the sun had begun to shine down on the track, drying it out quickly, which meant that the afternoon session began on an officially dry track. Taking advantage of this last chance to run before the coming opening round of the season, the teams went about their tests with fervor.

 

 

 

Session 3 of the two days of tests started on a mostly dry track with some wet spots. The session started as scheduled at 9:00. However, it wasn’t long before Kovalainen in No. 39 DENSO KOBELCO SARD LC500 (Heikki Kovalainen/Yuichi Nakayama), crashed on the second turn, bringing out the red Flag to halt the session.
After that there were no accidents or trouble until Karthikeyan in the No. 64 Modulo Epson NSX-GT (Narain Karthikeyan/Tadasuke Makino) came to a stop on the TGR Corner (first turn) ten minutes before the session was to end. With this, the Safety Car drill time originally scheduled for the end of the session was held early for ten minutes. After that Safety Car drill, the test session was continued for another 15 min. After that final 15 min. started, however, Karthikeyan crashed on the last turn. This brought out the Red Flag again and the session was ended at that point.

 

Car No. 39, which had crashed early in the session was unable to run for the rest of the morning, and the No. 64 car that had crashed at the end of the session lost half of the afternoon’s Session 4 time on repairs. However the mechanics of both teams had to be congratulated for getting the cars back in condition to run good times in Session 4 just 0.6 – 0.7 sec. behind the day’s top time.
The progression of the top time of the morning session saw Sasaki in the No. 12 CALSONIC IMPUL GT-R (Daiki Sasaki/James Rossiter) that had performed so strongly the day before record a top time of 1’28.621 shortly before the final Red Flag. But that time was beaten by Oshima No. 6 WAKO'S 4CR LC500 (Kazuya Oshima/Kenta Yamashita) in the final 15-min. after the restart with a time of 1’28.522, which remained the top time at the end of the morning session.

 

 

 

The start of the afternoon’s Session 4 was extended in length by 10 min. to start at 1:15 and run two hours until 3:25 as a 2 hr. and 10 min. session. In the early going, Yamashita in the No. 6 WAKO'S 4CR LC500 recorded a time of 1’28.786, which would remain unbeaten to the end of the session to stand as the session’s fastest time. The CALSONIC IMPUL GT-R followed that with the session’s second fastest time.

 

 

Among the Honda NSX-GT cars, the No. 64 Modulo Epson NSX-GT’s 5th-place time in the in the morning session and the No. 17 KEIHIN NSX-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi) team’s 6th-place time in the afternoon session were the best showings.
Commenting on these results was Masahiro Saiki, NSX-GT Project Leader at HRD Sakura, Honda’s motorsport research and development organization. Saiki said, “We left the test contents up to the individual teams, since we assume they each have their own strategies. No detailed statistics have been released, but they say that the handicap weights they carried in the tests were chosen to simulate expected conditions not only at Round 2 but also at Round 5 (also to be run at Fuji) as well.” Also, engineer Hitoshi Iyoki of the No. 1 RAYBRIG NSX-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Jenson Button) team said, “There was some amount of indecision on the best settings for us to use.” It was clear that the NSX-GT teams were not alone in an Official Test event this time with plenty of ups and downs for all.

 

 

 

 

In the GT300 class, the No. 34 Modulo KENWOOD NSX GT3 (Ryo Michigami/Hiroki Otsu) recorded a top time of 1’36.760 in the middle of the morning’s Session 3. After that, Sakaguchi in the No. 5 ADVICS MACH SHAKEN MC86 (Natsu Sakaguchi/Yuya Hiraki) recorded exactly the same time. Commenting later, Otsu said, “Last year I got some experience in ‘hako’ (passenger car based race cars) racing in Super Taikyu Series, so I have gotten used to them, but I didn’t know how to talk about the tire development side, so I studied by listening to Michigami-san’s comments. This time I was given the chance to run time attacks on a new set of tires, so I really wanted to get a top time,” he said with a smile.

 

 

In the afternoon’s Session 4, Aoki in the No. 360 RUNUP RIVAUX GT-R (Takayuki Aoki/Atsushi Tanaka/Yusaku Shibata) ran a top time of 1’36.530. The second fastest time went to Ishikawa in the No. 10 GAINER TANAX triple a GT-R (Kazuki Hoshino/Keishi Ishikawa). From this season, the No. 360 team uses the same current NISSAN GT-R NISMO GT3 as car No. 10’s team, but it seems that the team was plagued with machine trouble in the morning session. But with some fast service by NISMO, the team was able to come back and take the top time.

 

 

 

 

 

Now the last official test sessions before entering the first rounds of the season at Okayama and Fuji are over. Everyone’s thoughts now turn to the 2019 season opener. The stage for Round 1 will be the Okayama International Circuit. The first round’s qualifying is set for April 13, with the long awaited race to take place on the 4th.

 

 

 

 

The team’s flow had been good at the Okayama official tests, and we were able to run at a good pace from yesterday here at Fuji as well, getting the top time not only in the morning but the afternoon as well. So, it is a good feeling. The car has a good balance and we were able to get good results in our long-run tests as well. In the morning session we had an extra set of tires left, so I went onto the track with the intention of running a time attack on the new set of tires, but then the Safety Car drill started. But the tires were still at peak performance, so I was able to get the good time after the Safety Car drill was over. While I was running that lap I made some small mistakes, and if it hadn’t been for that I might have broken the 1’28 barrier. That’s how good the car felt. We want to keep this good flow going right into the opening round for sure.

 

For this season we changed to the 2018 model GT-R GT3. Until now we had been using the 2015 model, which we had continued to modify, but now this (2018) model is a very different machine (grins). The machine’s balance and the way it feels to drive is simply wonderful. It has changed from a machine that was just fast on the straights into a real cornering machine. That means there has been some sacrifice in the area of pure power, but the lap times are still faster all the same. Today our car was in good condition and got the fastest time, but the fact is that until yesterday we had been bothered by some minor troubles. But NISMO (the support company) was every quick to remedy them. This is the great thing about racing with a car made in Japan. Although this wasn’t an official qualifier, it was the first time in a while that we have gotten a top time, and I’m really happy.

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