2024 SUPER GT Round 5 Report

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The fifth round of the 2024 Super GT series, which was initially planned in late August but was postponed due to an approaching typhoon, took place on December 7th – 8th as the de facto final round.

It was pretty unusual to have a Super GT series round in December, even including the era of the All-Japan GT Championship, the predecessor of the Super GT. Consequently, the race distance was reduced from 350km to 300km on account of the sunset time. In addition, the race control added an extra formation lap in the race’s starting procedure to cope with the ultra-low-temperature conditions and also extended the duration of the qualifying session.

At the end of the previous round, Venteny Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure/Yuya Motojima) ranked second in the GT300 point standings, 11 points behind the leader. It meant that if they had secured the pole position in the qualifying and won the race as well, the chances of winning the title for them would be high, while it would still depend on the leader’s final result.

When the official practice prior to the qualifying began before noon on Saturday, December 7th, the air/track temperatures were 11/13 degrees centigrade. Although it was a sunny morning, the temperatures only rose to 14/19 degrees by the time when the session ended. Venteny Lamborghini made a good start to the weekend as it set the third-fastest time in the practice. In the GT500 class, Realize Corporation ADVAN Z (Tsugio Matsuda/Teppei Natori) finished ninth, two places ahead of WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra (Yuji Kunimoto/Sena Sakaguchi).

As the winter sunshine on this day continued to warm the tarmac, the track temperature rose further and reached 26 degrees at the start of the qualifying session, while the air temperature stayed at 14 degrees. In consideration of the fact that GT500 cars are lighter than GT300 cars in weight, which tends to be hard to heat their tires, the qualifying session for the GT500 class was held first in a warmer period just this once.

For Q1, Natori drove Realize Corporation ADVAN Z, and Kunimoto did WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra. Expectations were high for Natori’s performance because he snatched the pole position in the previous Autopolis round. After warming up his tires carefully, he started to push as hard as he could and set the time of 1’43”670, the fastest in the session and the new track record. Kunimoto’s best time was 1’44”526, which was the ninth fastest.

Unfortunately, Natori’s track record was very short-lived as, in Q2, many drivers bettered their partner’s time in Q1. Still, with Matsuda setting 1’43″935, Realize Corporation ADVAN Z secured fourth place by their combined time. And Sakaguchi’s impressive, best time, 1’43″888, improved WedSport ADVAN GR Supra’s qualifying position to seventh. Since one of the faster cars received a grid penalty, the starting grids of two Yokohama-shoed cars were promoted to the third and sixth, respectively.

As for the GT300 class, Venteny Lamborghini GT3 boosted its performance further in the qualifying. After Kogure conquered Q1 with the fastest time, 1’55″132, Motojima set 1’55″206, which ranked him second, and their combined time was good enough to claim the pole position. With this result, the pair earned three additional points, and the point deficit was reduced to eight because the championship leader ended the qualifying in tenth. So, they got a step closer to this year’s series champions.

In Q2, Realize Nissan Mechanic Challenge GT-R (Daiki Sasaki/Joao Paulo Lima de Oliveira), another Yokohama Tire user, showed incredible speed. The pair settled for fifth place by their combined time, but the best time Oliveira clocked, 1’55″092, was a new track record for the GT300 car and about 0.4 seconds faster than the existing record. This meant that the Brazilian, Nissan GT-R and Yokohama Tire were the new record holders.

On Sunday, December 8th, there were a few more clouds in the sky than the day before, so many felt cold in the morning hours. Before the race started, the Grid Walk event was held, and a lot of fans could feel the tension in the air on the starting grid. It got slightly warmer by that time, and the season’s final race got underway, with the air/track temperatures being at 15/22 degrees.

Motojima, behind the wheel of Venteny Lamborghini GT3, started smoothly and led the field. After building a bit of a gap with the car in second, he came into the pit at the end of Lap 18. Whereas other championship contenders tried to save time by not changing any tire at their stop, the team replaced two rear tires, and Kogure kicked off their second stint of the race from the interim eighth.

The championship leader had already made its pit stop before the Lamborghini crew did and was running in interim ninth when Kogure rejoined. On the other hand, the car in third in the point standings was ahead of him, thanks to its short stop by omitting tire change. And, as another crew took the same tactics and gained a few positions, Venteny Lamborghini GT3 was in third place when all GT300 cars had made their mandatory stop.

Then, Kogure started to show his brilliant performance. He shaved off the gap with the car in second a little by little and finally caught up with it on Lap 33, partly helped by a Full Course Yellow (FCY) period before that. On the next lap, after coming abreast of the car on the pit straight, he overtook it at Turn 1.

After that, he pulled up to the race leader quickly and passed it on the pit straight on Lap 39, regaining the lead. Kogure didn’t stop there and kept pulling away from the rest of the field. In the end, he received the checkered flag first after building a substantial nine-second gap with the car in second. It was a fantastic third consecutive win for them.

Venteny Lamborghini GT3 gained 23 points by its pole-to-win, and the outcome of the title fight depended on the finishing position of their main rival. At the moment it finished the race in fourth, Kogure, Motojima, and the JLOC team captured the championship titles. They are genuinely deserved winners, as they won four races out of eight in this year’s series. It was Motojima’s first title crown and Kogure’s first in the GT300 class. And, above all, the first-ever team title for JLOC, which has been competing for 30 years since the All-Japan GT Championship era.

Turning to the GT500 class, Realize Corporation ADVAN Z and WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra started the race with Natori and Kunimoto at the wheel, respectively. Natori lost a few positions during early laps before his tires were adequately heated. But his performance after that was remarkable as he could overtake his rivals one after another and even mark the fastest lap of the race. In their second stint, Matsuda drove consistently but fell into a situation where he needed to change tires in the closing stage, so they had to settle for 15th place at the end.

Sakaguchi drove for WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra’s second stint, and his best lap time during it was very close to Natori’s fastest time, which confirmed that the package had the potential in terms of its peak performance. However, it didn’t result in a good pace through the stint, and the car finished the race in 14th after chasing up the direct rivals ahead toward the end.