Honda Teams Admit Prelude Still Trailing Toyota at Okayama

Honda is still “behind” its GT500 rival manufacturers heading into the new SUPER GT season with the HRC Prelude-GT, according to figures from Team Kunimitsu and ARTA, following an official Okayama pre-season test dominated by Toyota.

The best of the five Preludes, the No. 17 Real Racing example driven by Koudai Tsukakoshi, ended up only eighth across two days of multi-class running last week as Toyota outfits swept all four sessions, led by the No. 36 TOM’S GR Supra.

However, on the second day, the top Honda time set by the Team Kunimitsu machine of Tadasuke Makino was good enough for second behind the No. 36 Toyota.

Reviewing the test, Kunimitsu chief engineer Satofumi Hoshi admitted that the team’s attention has only just started to turn towards setup work now that the Prelude’s aero package has been decided upon ahead of its homologation at the end of the month.

“Ahead of the opening round, Honda has decided on the aero package, so now we are at the next stage, which is to try and extract the performance,” Hoshi told Sportscar365.

“While Toyota and Nissan have stuck with the same base models, we are just starting off with something completely new, so honestly I think we are behind them.

“It was a similar story with the Civic two years ago, but we are still trying to work out the direction to go in and narrow down the setup window. This was our second time running at Okayama but we have only just started working mainly on setup.

“The character of the car is quite different from the Civic, and I think that many of the areas that the Honda teams struggled with the Civic are now improved.

“But, especially compared to the No. 36, there is still quite a gap. There were points during the test that we were able to set relatively similar times, but it’s not something we could do consistently. So I think we still have to catch up.”

ARTA’s two Preludes ended up 12th and 13th in the overall timesheets, with the best time set by Ren Sato putting the No. 16 car ahead of the HRC-backed No. 8.

Tomo Koike, who has returned to a chief engineer role this season on the No. 16 side of the garage, said he was relaxed about the gap between the Aguri Suzuki-owned team’s cars and the best of the Hondas, but warned Toyota remains ahead.

“Our situation is a bit different to the other Honda teams, but I think our performance is similar to the No. 100 [Kunimitsu] car,” Koike told Sportscar365.

“We were mostly focused on testing as many different tires as possible, so the lap time is not too important at this stage. Also, our ‘control’ tire compound [used to evaluate setup changes] is different from the No. 100 and No. 17 [Real Racing] cars.

“The Supra is very strong at this circuit, the gap is always three to five tenths. In the previous tests at Fuji and Sepang, the Supra was also fast. Toyota still has the edge, so I think the target for us [in Round 1] will be to score a podium.”

Tsukakoshi: Prelude Should Be More “Consistent” Than Civic

Tsukakoshi, who shares the Real Prelude with GT500 rookie Yuto Nomura this year, gave a positive impression of his first outings with the Prelude, having also set the fastest time in the makers’ test that proceeded official running on Wednesday.

However, with a gap of over half a second between his best time and that of TOM’S pacesetter Sho Tsuboi, the Honda veteran admitted he had hoped for more.

“I would say that we are still lacking a little in performance, and I think it’s the same for the whole Honda camp,” said Tsukakoshi after the first day of running.

“The characteristics of the car have changed a lot from the Civic, so we have been trying many different things in the tests up to now, and we found a good direction, a certain ‘sweet spot’, that served as the basis for our plan in this test.

“Nomura is acclimatizing well and showing good speed, so there are no worries for me on that side. My feedback has also been very similar to his.

“We were the top Honda, but I still wish we were a little higher up the order.”

Asked to compared the Prelude with the Civic, Tsukakoshi added that the new machine should have a broader working window based on his impressions so far.

“With the Civic, it was quite sensitive to changes in conditions and it was difficult to get the setup exactly right,” said the 39-year-old.

“The Prelude feels a bit more consistent, so my hope is that we will be able to maintain our performance more, and be strong at any circuit and in any conditions.”