2022.05.28

Rd. 3 Qualifying GT500: WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra takes second consecutive pole position, and GR Supra GT500s finish 1-2 in Suzuka qualifying!

Round 3 Suzuka circuit : Qualifying GT500

The qualifying for the Takanoko Hotel SUZUKA GT 300km RACE, Round 3 of the 2022 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series took place at Suzuka Circuit (one lap: 5,807 m) in Mie Prefecture on May 28 (Sat). In the GT500 class, Kunimoto in the No. 19 WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra (Yuji Kunimoto/Sena Sakaguchi) ran a Suzuka course record to take the team’s first pole position in ten years of GT500 class competition. In the GT300 class, Kondo in the No. 7 Studie BMW M4 (Seiji Ara/Tsubasa Kondo) gave the team their first class pole.

 

 

 

 

 

　On this day at Suzuka Circuit the air temperature reached 26℃ at the start of the morning’s official practice, and when the GT300 class Q1 qualifying began at 2:55 in the afternoon, it had risen to 28℃, unusually hot for May. Also, a delay in the qualifying and race of the FIA-F4 support race caused the GT500 class Q1 qualifying to start 10 minutes later than scheduled at 3:28 in the afternoon.
　Due the inability to repair the machine trouble that brought the No. 38 ZENT CERUMO GR Supra (Yuji Tachikawa/Hiroaki Ishiura) to a stop in the morning’s official practice in time, it was unable to compete in the qualifying. As a result, the 10-minute Q1 session was competed by 14 cars. The cars began to take to the track about two minutes after the start of the session, and then took their first and second laps on the track for warming up their tires before beginning their timed attacks.
　In the attacks, the first car to show amazing speed was the No. 3 CRAFTSPORTS MOTUL Z (Katsumasa Chiyo) that had suffered a crash three weeks earlier in the race of Round 2 and came to this round at Suzuka with what was almost a completely rebuilt car. In an all-out effort, Chiyo recorded a target time of 1’44.230, which not only put him at the top of the time board but also beat the Suzuka course record that had stood untouched since 2018.
　While other cars were able to run in the 1’44 range one after another, the closest any came to the time of No. 3 was that of the No. 39 DENSO KOBELCO SARD GR Supra (Yuhi Sekiguchi) in 2nd-position a good 0.591 sec. slower. Eventually, No. 3 finished at the top in Q1, leading all rivals by a large margin. Finishing Q1 in 2nd and 3rd positions were car No. 39 and the No. 37 KeePer TOM'S GR Supra (Sacha Fenestraz) respectively, giving notice that the GT500 TOYOTA/LEXUS that had recently struggled to compete well at Suzuka was now a different machine this season. Following these, 4th position went to the No. 17 Astemo NSX-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi). Meanwhile, the No. 23 MOTUL AUTECH Z (Tsugio Matsuda) and the No. 100 STANLEY NSX-GT (Naoki Yamamoto) failed to move on to Q2, as did also the No. 14 ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra (Kenta Yamashita) that had won Round 1 of this season.

 

 

 

　　The 10-minnute GT500 class Q2 session began at 4:06 in the afternoon. The first to record a fast time was the No. 3 CRAFTSPORTS MOTUL Z (Mitsunori Takaboshi), and while it couldn’t quite match the record set in Q1, its 1’44.425 time was enough to put it atop the time board. Coming close to this time were the No. 17 Astemo NSX-GT (Nobuharu Matsushita) and the No. 37 KeePer TOM'S GR Supra (Ritomo Miyata), but they failed to beat No. 3’s time. However, during the lap when the checkered flag was shown, it was Yuji Kunimoto in the No. 19 WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra that had won pole position at the previous round at Fuji who delivered with an impressive lap time. Kunnimoto’s super lap of 1’44.112 beat the course record set in this day’s Q1 to move to the top of the time board. Then came another car. After a mistake on his first timed lap, Miyata in car No. 37 recorded a lap of 1’44.269 to move into 2nd position behind car No. 19. With this, the TOYOTA GR Supra GT500 that until now had struggled at Suzuka managed an impressive 1-2 finish in the qualifying.
　For the No. 19 WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra (Yuji Kunimoto/Sena Sakaguchi) it was their second straight pole position this season, and for Kunimoto it was his first pole position in ten years of competition in the GT500 class. Finishing 2nd in the qualifying was the No. 37 KeePer TOM'S GR Supra (Sacha Fenestraz/Ritomo Miyata), while 3rd position went to the CRAFTSPORTS MOTUL Z (Katsumasa Chiyo/Mitsunori Takaboshi) and 4th to the No. 16 Red Bull MOTUL MUGEN NSX-GT (Ukyo Sasahara/Toshiki Oyu), making this a fierce qualifying competition that saw all three car makes and the four tire makes of Yokohama, Bridgestone, Michelin and Dunlop all squeezing into the top four qualifying positions.

 

 

 

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