TOM’S Delivers Toyota Record Seventh Win in Succession

TOM’S duo Ukyo Sasahara and Giuliano Alesi scored victory in the third round of the SUPER GT season at Sepang, giving Toyota a record seventh GT500 win in a row.

In a caution-free 55-lap race at the Malaysian circuit, Sasahara and Alesi took the No. 37 Toyota GR Supra to a comfortable 19.046-second win over the No. 8 ARTA Honda Civic Type R-GT shared by Tomoki Nojiri and Nobuharu Matsushita.

Completing the podium was the Impul Nissan Z NISMO of Bertrand Baguette and Kazuki Hiramine, albeit only after a penalty for the Team Kunimitsu Honda.

The pole-winning Racing Project Bandoh Toyota of Yuji Kunimoto led the opening part of the race, but Kunimoto couldn’t shake the attentions of fellow front-row starter Matsushita in the ARTA Honda.

Taking advantage of traffic, Matsushita made an opportunistic pass to lead at the Turn 9 hairpin, and held the lead until making his mandatory pit stop on lap 21.

Meanwhile, Sasahara maintained his grid slot of fourth place in the No. 37 TOM’S Toyota and passed the Nakajima Racing Honda of Riki Okusa for third, and assumed the lead when both of the leading cars made their pit stops.

Sasahara stayed on board until lap 32, and some rapid laps combined with swift pit work from the TOM’S mechanics enabled Alesi to come out ahead of Nojiri, who took over from Matsushita at the wheel of the No. 8 Honda.

Nojiri closed in as Alesi got his Bridgestone tires up to temperature, the two cars going side-by-side through Turn 14, but Alesi held on and managed to stretch his advantage, ultimately delivering his third win in GT500 together with Sasahara.

Toyota’s seventh win in succession in points-scoring races also surpasses the previous benchmark of six in a row scored by Honda across 1998 and ’99.

While Nojiri held second to the finish, giving he and Matsushita their first podium finish of the year, Hiramine passed Sena Sakaguchi in the Bandoh Toyota for third place, and looked like he could threaten for second until falling back.

But Hiramine then had to contend with the charging Kunimitsu Honda of Tadasuke Makino, who was the driver on the move in the second stint having taken over from Naoki Yamamoto on lap 20.

However, during an earlier battle with the Cerumo Toyota of Toshiki Oyu, Makino earned a 10-second time penalty for pushing Oyu wide exiting the final corner.

That meant that even though Makino was able to pass Hiramine for third on in the road in the closing stages, the Kunimitsu car fell to sixth behind the Real Honda of Koudai Tsukakoshi and Shun Koide as well as the Bandoh Toyota.

Reigning champions Sho Tsuboi and Kenta Yamashita recovered from a first-lap spin, triggered by contact with the SARD Toyota of Yuhi Sekiguchi, to score valuable points for seventh place in the No. 1 TOM’S Toyota.

It means Tsuboi and Yamashita continue to lead the championship on 39 points, nine points clear of Sasahara and Alesi in second.

Sekiguchi earned a drive-through penalty for the incident, with a second penalty later in the race leaving he and Sacha Fenestraz 14th and last of the finishers, ahead of only the Kondo Racing Nissan that didn’t start due to a driveshaft problem.

Team UpGarage Hangs On for Narrow GT300 Win

In the GT300 class, the Team UpGarage Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo of Takashi Kobayashi and rookie Yuto Nomura took the spoils by a less than a second after a race-long battle with the Saitama Green Brave Toyota GR Supra GT.

Kobayashi, who won on SUPER GT’s last visit to Sepang in 2013, held on by just 0.933 seconds from Hiroki Yoshida’s Toyota after seeing an eight-second gap dramatically shrink in the closing stages of the race.

It had been the Saitama Green Brave car that led early on as Seita Nonaka passed his opposite number Nomura, stretching a 10-second gap out front, but a slow pit stop for the No. 52 crew handed the initiative back to the UpGarage Mercedes-AMG.

Behind the leading two cars, Goodsmile Racing’s substitute duo of Yuhki Nakayama and Shunji Okumoto came through for the final step on the podium.

Debutant Okumoto proved the star of the race as he set the class’s fastest lap in his stint, later passing veteran Takashi Kogure in the No. 0 JLOC Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 in the closing stages after a lengthy battle.

Kogure then fell prey to his stablemate Natsu Sakaguchi in the No. 87 Lamborghini. However, a post-race 40-second penalty for the No. 87 car for multiple track limits violation meant Kogure and teammate Yuya Motojima were promoted back to fourth.

Points leaders Naoya Gamou and Togo Suganami came home seventh in the LEON Racing Mercedes-AMG, maintaining a 12-point championship advantage over Inging Toyota drivers Yuui Tsutsumi and Hibiki Taira, who finished fifth.

Both EBM-entered wildcards struggled, with the Porsche 911 GT3 R shared by local Adrian D’Silva and Porsche Motorsport Asia-Pacific selected driver Dorian Boccolacci the better-placed of the two entries in 17th place.

Jazeman Jaafar and Kerong Li were 19th in their Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo, with all 19 cars in class making the checkered flag.

RESULTS: GT500/GT300