45 Cars on Bumper Entry List

A bumper field of 45 cars including 30 GT300 runners is set to contest this year’s Super GT Series.

The recently-published season-opening entry list also includes the 15 previously confirmed GT500 efforts from Honda, Nissan and Toyota.

A total of six Toyota GR Supras will take part in the car’s first season with five of the entries from Cerumo, SARD and TOM’S running on Bridgestone tires while Team Banoh will have Yokohamas.

Five Honda NSX-GTs will be present, including ARTA, Team Kunimitsu and Keihin Real Racing’s Bridgestone-shod cars, plus a Yokohama entry from Team Mugen and a Dunlop entry from Nakajima Racing.

Nissan is fielding four GT-Rs with NDDP Racing and NISMO siding with Dunlop, while Team Impul and Kondo Racing have chosen Michelin and Yokohama respectively.

The tire selections are the same as last year for all teams, while all three manufacturers announced their GT500 driver lineups in the first two months of 2020.

Reigning champion Team LeMans won’t return to defend its title while Kenta Yamashita, who shared the winning Lexus with Kazuya Oshima last year, has also left the series.

The LeMans entry will be taken up by Cerumo which has two GT Supras listed including onoe for Oshima and Sho Tsuboi.

A total of 12 car brands will be represented in the GT300 class which mostly features GT3 machinery but also includes older series-specific Mother Chassis cars.

Teams have entered GT3s from Mercedes-AMG, Lexus, Aston Martin, BMW, Nissan, Honda, Audi, Porsche and Lamborghini, while other cars designed for GT300 from Lotus, Toyota and Subaru will also take part.

No McLarens are entered after 24 Hours of Le Mans winner Team Goh chose not to return for a second season with the 720S GT3.

The entry list includes defending champion Team Aguri, which is returning with an Evo version of its Honda NSX GT3 and has replaced the GT500-bound Nirei Fukuzumi with Japanese F3 racer Toshiki Oyu in its driver lineup.

Double Nürburgring 24 winner and Audi factory driver Christopher Mies will make his Super GT debut in Team Hitotsuyama’s Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo alongside Shintaro Kawabata.

Former GT500 regular and D’Station Aston Martin drier Joao Paulo de Oliveira, meanwhile, has switched to Nissan squad Kondo Racing for his sophomore GT300 campaign.

D’Station’s move away from Yokohama tires has signaled the arrival of a fourth tire brand in Michelin which will supply the team’s Vantage GT3 of Tomonobu Fujii and Nicki Thiim. 

Of the other cars, a total of 19 will compete on Yokohama tires while five are on Bridgestones and three are on Dunlops.

The first round of the 2020 Super GT series takes place at Okayama on Apr. 11-12.