SARD Toyota Ends Four-Year Win Drought at Autopolis

The SARD Toyota team ended a four-year SUPER GT win drought in Sunday’s sixth round of the season at Autopolis, as Yuhi Sekiguchi and Yuichi Nakayama scored their first victory as a duo aboard the No. 39 Toyota GR Supra.

Sekiguchi and Nakayama prevailed at the end of an action-packed three-hour race that featured four safety car periods, including one that effectively ended the race after a big crash for Subaru driver Takuto Iguchi, amid multiple incidents.

Completing the podium were a pair of Nissan Z crews, with the No. 23 NISMO car of Katsumasa Chiyo and Ronnie Quintarelli coming home second ahead of the sister No. 3 machine of Mitsunori Takaboshi and Atsushi Miyake.

It marks the fourth win in six races for a Toyota crew this year, and a first for SARD since 2020, when Nakayama won alongside Heikki Kovalainen at Fuji.

Sekiguchi made strong progress from tenth on the grid, and had already made it as far as fourth place when the first caution was called in response to the Racing Project Bandoh Toyota coming to a stop out on track on lap 23 of an eventual 92.

Leading at this stage was Chiyo in the best of the NISMO Nissans after a bold inside move on the pole-winning Kondo Z of Tsugio Matsuda on lap 12.

Chiyo maintained the lead after the first round of stops that followed the first safety car period, staying on board the No. 23 car for a double stint, while Sekiguchi handed over the SARD Toyota to Nakayama.

The safety car was called again on lap 38 in response to a Turn 7 crash for the Real Racing Honda Civic Type R-GT for Kakunoshin Ohta following contact with the Rookie Racing Toyota of Kazuya Oshima, who was handed a drive-through penalty.

While that caution didn’t impact the strategies of the lead GT500 contenders, the third safety car period, triggered by a crash for Nakajima Racing Honda man Takuya Izawa on lap 62, was critical in SARD’s rise from fourth to the lead.

With the two-hour maximum drive time looming, Chiyo pitted from the lead on lap 60 to hand over the No. 23 car to Quintarelli, while Nakayama came in the following lap, but crucially with no driver change to complete.

That allowed the SARD squad to make a faster stop, resulting in Nakayama inheriting the lead as Quintarelli was forced to slow when the safety car came out.

Once the cars that had hadn’t pitted before the safety car made their last stops, Nakayama was left in the lead ahead of Quintarelli and Naoki Yamamoto’s Team Kunimitsu Honda, which was on a similar strategy to the SARD car.

Nakayama was able to quickly create a gap over Quintarelli, and was some nine seconds clear when the safety car that effectively ended the race was called in response to Iguchi’s crash in the Subaru BRZ GT300 car on lap 87.

While Quintarelli hung on to second, Yamamoto was passed by the No. 3 Nissan of Miyake, who had taken over from Takaboshi at the second round of stops.

Kazuki Hiramine made it three Nissans in the top five in the Team Impul Z he shared with Bertrand Baguette, while the No. 16 ARTA Honda of Hiroki Otsu and Ren Sato finished sixth, recovering from an earlier spin for Otsu.

Leading the group of cars disadvantaged by the third safety car was the championship-leading No. 36 TOM’S Toyota of Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita in seventh.

With the sister No. 37 TOM’S car of Ukyo Sasahara and Giuliano Alesi finishing one place behind in eighth, it means Tsuboi and Yamashita take a two-point lead into the final two races of the season, with Yamamoto and his Kunimitsu Honda teammate Tadasuke Makino level on points with Sasahara and Alesi.

A bizarre spin for Teppei Natori during the final safety car period meant the Kondo Nissan that started on pole ended up down in 12th at the finish.

JLOC Profits From Safety Car for Second GT300 Win of Season

In the GT300 class, the third safety car period paved the way for Takashi Kogure and Yuya Motojima to score their second win of the season aboard the No. 88 JLOC Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2.

Only a small number of cars in the lower class cleared their second mandatory stop before the third caution triggered by Izawa’s crash, including the No. 88 JLOC car and the championship-leading No. 2 Inging Toyota GR86 GT.

A drive-through penalty for a safety car infraction prevented the car shared by Hibiki Taira and Yuui Tsutsumi, who had fought their way up from 14th on the grid to lead, from challenging Kogure and Motojima in the closing stages.

Prior to the critical safety car period, it had been the Inging car leading the apr Lexus LC500h, the works Subaru BRZ and the No. 88 Lamborghini, but a spin for Jin Nakamura in the Lexus removed that car from contention.

Instead it was the K-tunes Racing Lexus RC F GT3 of Morio Nitta and Shinichi Takagi that completed the podium in third place ahead of the Team Studie BMW M4 GT3 and the D’station Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo.

Another beneficiary of the safety car period was the No. 6 Team LeMans Ferrari 296 GT3 that started from pole, but Roberto Merhi made a third stop in the closing stages as he struggled for pace, and the final safety car period following Iguchi’s crash prevented the ex-Formula 1 driver from making use of his fresh rubber, leaving him eighth.

With the points-leading LEON Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo finishing sixth, it means Naoya Gamou and Takuro Shinohara lead the drivers’ standings by five points ahead of Taira and Tsutsumi, with Motojima and Kogure 16 points down in third.

RESULTS: GT500/GT300