2022.03.27

【Official test at Fuji: Day 2】 DENSO KOBELCO SARD GR Supra marks fastest in the afternoon! GT300 best lap time goes to PACIFIC hololive NAC Ferrari.

Official test: Fuji Speedway 3/27 (Sun)

Day 2 of the official test took place at Fuji Speedway on March 27 in weather conditions where rain dropped and stopped repeatedly. Given it was the last official test before the season opening round in Okayama (April 16 and 17), teams continuously sent their cars to the track, despite the climate, for checking as well as to try various settings to match rain tires, which could only be done in rain conditions. Rain had stopped in the afternoon which gave the teams opportunities to execute test scenarios on dry track surface which many teams could not do enough up to that point in the official test.

 

 

 

　Rain fell just before the start of Session 3, but it paused as the cars started running. After a short while, however, rain drops started to come down again, and then from there it rained on and off which affected the amount of water on the track surface to increase and decrease.
　Both classes ran in mixture for 1 hour and 55 minutes in the morning which followed by 10-minute exclusive running time for each class. SC (Safety Car) drill also took place for 15 minutes from 10AM.
　Nissan Z GT500 squad kept the momentum from the afternoon session of previous day on the track surface that was completely wet from start to end of Session 3, and the top lap time was marked by No.3 CRAFTSPORTS MOTUL Z (Katsumasa Chiyo) with 1 min 36.895. No.23 MOTUL AUTECH Z (Ronnie Quintarelli) stood at second with 1 min 36.895. No.8 ARTA NSX-GT (Tomoki Nojiri / Nirei Fukuzumi), No.14 ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra (Kazuya Oshima / Kenta Yamashita), and No.12 CALSONIC IMPUL Z (Kazuki Hiramine / Bertrand Baguette) followed.
　One of the GT300 cars span at TGR corner and hit the wall located at inside of the turn at just passed 11AM. Red flag was shown to suspend the session, but it resumed in about 10 minutes. The session moved on to class-wise exclusive time, but the morning session reached the end without lap times getting renewed.

 

 

 

　Session 4 in the afternoon started 30 minutes earlier than scheduled at 13:30 and finished 30 minutes later than the plan at 16:30 to make up a 3-hour session to compensate for the 1-hour reduction of the session from the previous day.
　Rain had stopped in the afternoon, however, the session started with the track surface continued to be damp. Early part of the session was complete wet, and No.3 CRAFTSPORTS MOTUL Z and No.23 MOTUL AUTECH Z were the top 2.
　Record line started to dry up when it was pass 1 hour into the session. Lap times of each car started to reduce from the effect and No.39 DENSO KOBELCO SARD GR Supra (Yuhi Sekiguchi) recorded 1 min 28.276, which eventually became the top lap time of the session.
　Honda NSX-GT squad occupied second and third positions of Session 4 with No.8 ARTA NSX-GT (Tomoki Nojiri) and No.17 Astemo NSX-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi / Nobuharu Matsushita). No.3 CRAFTSPORTS MOTUL Z brought its Nissan Z to fourth place.
　With Nakayama not feeling well, Sekiguchi drove No.39 car for entire 2 days by himself, but, by capturing the top lap time during the final phase of 2 days, he was able to demonstrate his ability as defending champion to everybody including his new team he joined this season.

 

 

 

 

 

 

　In the GT300 class, 26 cars ran in Day 2 after No.10 TANAX GAINER GT-R canceled their participation after crashing out in the afternoon of previous day.
　No.88 weibo Primez Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure) marked a top lap time first with 1 min 44.838 in earlier phase of the morning (Session 3) on wet track surface. No.4 GOODSMILE HATSUNE MIKU AMG (Tatsuya Kataoka) became second with a lap time it recorded at very last minutes followed by No.18 UPGARAGE NSX GT3 (Kakunoshin Ota), which had been quick in both dry and wet from the first day of test.
　No.88 weibo Primez Lamborghini GT3 continued to be fast in the afternoon and got up to the top with 1 min 36.820 which Motojima recorded as soon as the track surface became dry. From there, Ota in No.18 UPGARAGE NSX GT3 marked 1 min 36.543 and then No.9 PACIFIC Hololive NAC Ferrari (Kei Cozzolino) clocked 1 min 36.142 in the last part of the session to claim the best lap time of the class of Day 2.

　Official test at Fuji came to a closure to send off the series for the season opening round of 2022 AUTOBACS SUPER GT, taking place in 3 weeks at Okayama International Circuit on April 16 (Sat) and 17 (Sun).

 

 

 

 

My partner, (Yuichi) Nakayama, was not feeling well, so I drove in all 4 sessions in 2 days, but physically I had no issues at all. This was my second official test after I joined the new team and it was a good test. We couldn't get a good setup on the car yesterday, and we discussed and tried a new setup today and it worked out well. That let me mark the top lap time. Getting a top time is nice, but what I'm also happy about is that we worked together to come up with a solution and, also, my idea was accepted. That enhanced my sense of being part of the team. Now I'm more confident about the season opener.

 

We couldn't get a great outcome yesterday, but the setup we tried today was good. I knew from before, but it reminded me again that Ferrari is fantastic. It's perfect already. It felt really good as I drove. One more thing, it's nice that I was able to mark the top time, but my partner and the owner (of CARGUY), (Takeshi) Kimura, was also doing very well and driving constantly in the (1 min) 38 second mark. This will be a big advantage to the team. I will push hard from the season opener!

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