Honda Left to Lick Wounds After “Worst Race of Recent Years”

Honda has described its showing in last weekend’s SUPER GT Fuji sprint race as its “worst result of recent years”, as its Civic Type R-GT found itself outclassed by both the Toyota GR Supra and Nissan Z NISMO in both legs of the event.

GT500 project leader Masahiro Saiki made the remarks following Sunday’s GT500-only race in which just one of the five Hondas, the Dunlop-shod No. 64 Nakajima Racing machine of Riki Okusa, managed to break into the top ten, finishing eighth.

The remaining Honda teams, all using Bridgestone tires, failed to score points.

Toyota dominated both races, locking out the top five on Saturday and sweeping the top four on Sunday on a weekend where success ballast was not in use.

Saiki told reporters: “We were unable to make significant improvements from [Saturday], and the tires that the teams brought did not perform well even with the race held at this time of day, so I think these two days were our worst result of recent years.

“Okusa did well battling in the middle of the pack and was able to come away with points, which was positive. But for the Bridgestone Civics, it was a tough weekend, so we need to thoroughly review the data heading into the second half of the season.”

In Saturday’s mixed race, Tadasuke Makino scored the best result for the Honda camp in seventh for Team Kunimitsu, although he finished eighth on the road and moved up a place after Nissan driver Daiki Sasaki earned a five-second penalty.

Speaking after co-driver Naoki Yamamoto finished 12th on Sunday, Makino said the weekend proved the difference in quality between the Civic and the GR Supra.

“There is a big gap especially to Toyota, and also to Nissan,” Makino told Sportscar365.

“We were struggling with how to use the tire properly; we can’t use a wide range. That’s one we reason we struggled, and also because we have less downforce, we have to use more wing and we are struggling too much with the straight line speed. In Saturday’s race, I was struggling so much with the straight line speed.

“It was a really difficult weekend for Honda. The gap to the other makers is huge. I think the other cars have improved a lot [since last year].”

Honda introduced the Civic last year as the replacement for the NSX-GT, with a radically different aerodynamic concept that was designed to perform better over a wider range of circuits than the high-downforce, high-drag NSX.

However, Honda’s head of car development Tomohiro Onishi said that knowing the Civic doesn’t have any circuits where it is particularly strong made the outcome of the no-ballast Fuji weekend an even bigger disappointment for the brand.

Onishi said: “When we used the mid-engined NSX, we carried quite a bit of weight and the car had a lot of drag, so we got used to seeing it struggling at Fuji.

“At that time, we knew we would be able to bounce back at other circuits, and we had our good and bad tracks. However, we’re aware that this is not the case with our current car, so the result has come as quite a shock.

“Toyota has made an exceptionally fast car that can be quick even while carrying weight and fuel-flow restrictors, and they have five cars [on Bridgestone tires] with similar potential, and if they perform on the same level, they can lock out the top positions.

“Now we are in the second year of an aero freeze, each manufacturer is able to extract the most from their respective cars. Against that backdrop, we should have done better, but we had some mismatches that held us back, which led to this result.”

Makino and Yamamoto remain the top Honda drivers in the championship on 26 points, but have fallen 30.5 points behind TOM’S Toyota pair Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita, who finished first and second in their respective races.

While hopeful the return of success ballast will change things at Suzuka, Makino admitted that bridging such a large gap in the remaining four races is unlikely.

“At Suzuka, the No. 1 [TOM’S car] has a stage-three fuel flow restrictor, and some of the other Toyotas have restrictors,” said Makino. “So I think it’s a chance for us.

“At the minimum, we have to be on the podium to stay in the fight for the championship. But anyway, the championship looks difficult now.”