2023.03.11

Official Test Okayama I Day 1: Fukuzumi fastest in the No. 16 ARTA MUGEN NSX-GT! Fastest in GT300 is the No. 88 Lamborghini

Official Test Okayama International Circuit Mar. 11 (Sat.)

Prior to the opening round of the 2023 AUTOBACS SUPER GT series (Apr. 15, 16), the first SUPER GT Official Tests began on March 11 at Okayama International Circuit. Participating in these tests were all 15 GT500 class entries and 27 GT300 class entries were on hand to take part in the first tests to use the carbon-neutral fuel (CNF) that will be used this season. All of the teams put their best into the tests, working on machine set-up and driver practice and mastery.

 

 

 

For this year’s official test sessions, the paddock area was declared open to the public, and many fans were seen looking on from behind the pit garages. This day being the date of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, the teams and event officials lined up to observe a moment of silence in honor of the victims before the start of the tests.

 

 

At the start of the first session, the cars took to the track led by last year’s double Driver and Team champions, the No.1 MARELLI IMPUL Z (Kazuki Hiramine/Bertrand Baguette) leading the pack from the No. 1 pit.
In the early going, one car from each of the three manufacturers, the No. 1 MARELLI IMPUL Z, the No. 14 ENEOS X PRIME GR Supra (Kazuya Oshima) and the No. 17 Astemo NSX-GT (Koudai Tsukakoshi/Nobuharu Matsushita), held the top three positions on the time monitor.
In the middle stages of the session, the Honda NXS-GT teams improved on their lap times with the No. 16 ARTA MUGEN NSX-GT (Nirei Fukuzumi/Hiroki Otsu) and the No. 100 STANLEY NSX-GT (Naoki Yamamoto/Tadasuke Makino) moving into the top two spots respectively, while the 3rd to 5th positions went to the No. 36 au TOM'S GR Supra (Sho Tsuboi/Ritomo Miyata), No. 8 ARTA MUGEN NSX-GT (Tomoki Nojiri/Toshiki Oyu) and the No. 1 Z machine respectively.

With 35 minutes remaining in the morning session, one of the GT300 cars suffered machine trouble that brought it to a stop on the trac. This brought out the Red Flag to stop the action for roughly five minutes. After that, there was no serious trouble before the session came to an end as planned at 12:00 noon.

 

 

 

 

　

In the afternoon session 2, it was again the No. 1 MARELLI IMPUL Z that was first to take to the track. During the mixed class part of this session 2, the No. 24 Realize corporation ADVAN Z (Daiki Sasaki/Kouhei Hirate) recorded a time of 1’ 18.861 in the early going and continued to top the time monitor throughout the session.
Then, the 10-minute GT500 class-only session was run. In this session, a good number of the cars improved on their times recorded in the mixed-class session. In this session, the No. 16 ARTA MUGEN NSX-GT recorded the fastest time of the afternoon with a lap of 1’18.421, which was followed by a margin of just 0.18 sec. the other ARTA car, the No. 8 ARTA MUGEN NSX-GT in second position. Third position went to the No. 3 Niterra MOTUL Z (Katsumasa Chiyo/Mitsunori Takaboshi). And 4th position went to another NSX-GT car, the No. 100 STANLEY NSX-GT.

 

 

 

 

On this day, it was certainly the speed of the NSX machines that stood out. But the HRC Large Project Leader (LPL) in charge of overall development for the NSX-GT teams, Masahiro Saeki, commented with a wry smile, saying, “We thought that the Toyota teams were leading in terms of modifications concerning the CNF fuel. And we also heard that the Nissan cars were fast, so we thought that Honda would be behind the other two makers.” And when asked about today’s top times, he replied that, “It was Toyota-san that had remained the cleanest.” And when asked about the true meaning of that statement, he added, “Looking at the exhaust pipes, it was the Toyota cars that were the cleanest. The Nissan cars were a bit dirtier, and the Honda cars were the dirtiest.” About the degree of progress at this point, he said “We don’t know 100% (the final destination) is. And I think more progress will be made during the season.” Finally, Saeki LPL went on to say, “It is the same with every issue, for example, in the case of fuel, the aim is to burn the fuel we are given as completely as possible, and by improving combustion we will get complete combustion. Because that will lead to the greatest production of power in the end.” So, that means that we will have to keep our eyes on the development of the GT500 class engines beyond just the opening round at Okayama.

 

　

 

 

 

 

　The GT300 class morning Session 1 saw Kogure in the No. 88 JLOC Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure/Yuya Motojima) record a time of 1’25.400 about 30 minutes into the session. After that, the No. 6 DOBOT Audi R8 LMS (Yoshiaki Katayama/Roberto Merhi Muntan/Seiya Jin) ran a 1’25.759 lap and the No. 96 K-tunes RC F GT3 (Morio Nitta/Shinichi Takagi) ran a 1’25.766 to follow in 2nd and 3rd positions respectively, and after this no other cars were able to beat the times of these top three.

In the afternoon’s Session 2, Miyake in the No. 244 HACHI-ICHI GR Supra GT (Kimiya Sato/Atsushi Miyake) ran a time of 1’26.119 during the mixed-class session. This time was not beaten in the GT300-only session, making it the fastest time in Session 2. However, the best time of the day overall was the time recorded by car No. 88 in the morning session. As for the No. 66 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi/Hideki Yamauchi) that finished last year’s series ranked 2nd, it developed transmission trouble in the middle stages of Session 2 and had to drop out of the tests at that point. With that, it finished 24th in the afternoon session.

 

 

 

 

It wasn’t bad that we got the fastest time on the first day of this first official test of the season, but I had the feeling that I wasn’t able to really achieve what I had hoped for. However, the fact is that there is still room for improvement.
This year the team is competing with two cars, and I can feel the effect of that, as there are a number of places where the two cars are not exactly the same (in set-up). So, it has become important for me to adapt to the car to bring out its performance to the fullest. The change to a two-car entry was the result of agreement by the entire team along with (manager Suzuki) Aguri-san, and the desire to win the championship in the NSX-GT’s final year in competition. So, I want to do my best to live up to those expectations.

 

Being the first official test of the season, we came to it with a big menu of things to test. And it feels like we got the fastest time as a result of working through that menu. And since we don’t know whether the rival teams were giving it their best shot or not, we can’t really be too optimistic about the fact that we got the fastest time. It was the same last year, in that we were fast in the official tests before the opening round but once the season started, there were many times when we couldn’t repeat that speed to effect in the qualifying practices or the races. And there were often cases where there was a sudden change in conditions (air or track temperatures, etc.) in the races or qualifying, so I want to see us become good at handling those kinds of situations.

 

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