TOM’S Toyota On Top Again in Final Private GT500 Test

Photo: Uncredited

Toyota’s flagship SUPER GT team TOM’S wrapped up the third and final unofficial GT500 test of the off-season at Fuji Speedway fastest.

Sho Tsuboi as at the wheel of the No. 1 Toyota GR Supra when its best time of 1:26.072 was recorded in the opening session of the two-day test on Thursday morning, albeit less than a tenth of a second faster than the best of the Honda Civic Type R-GTs.

The No. 99 HRC development car, which had also been running on Wednesday together with the No. 17 Real Racing Civic that had missed the second day of the previous, snow-impacted test at Okayama, was fastest of all on Friday.

Tadasuke Makino set the best lap of 1:26.167 in the carbon-liveried Honda to get within 0.095 seconds of Tsuboi’s benchmark.

Just two thousandths of a second further back was the sole Dunlop tire user in GT500, the No. 64 Nakajima Racing Honda in which Riki Okusa went second on the opening day.

The two-day test comprised eight-and-a-half hours of running, with all teams handed an extra half-hour to compensate for disruptions at Okayama earlier in the month, plus an extra two hours for teams with new chassis to shake down.

One of those was the No. 12 Impul Nissan Z NISMO, although the car only completed a handful of laps across the test as the team was ineligible to fully participate in the test with its new chassis, bedecked in plain light blue livery.

This is down to new rules preventing the Bridgestone-shod cars that participated in January’s Sepang test getting further mileage on domestic soil.

Bertrand Baguette’s best lap aboard the No. 12 Nissan on the second day, a 1:26.220, was 0.148 seconds off the pace of Tsuboi’s chart-topping effort.

Third on the opening day and fifth overall was the No. 38 Cerumo Toyota of Toshiki Oyu, followed by the ARTA Honda in which Tomoki Nojiri set the best time.

The No. 23 NISMO Nissan was one of the few cars to record its best time in the final session of the test, Katsumasa Chiyo putting the car seventh ahead of the SARD Toyota (Sacha Fenestraz) and the Real Honda (Koudai Tsukakoshi).

Yokohama’s pair of GT500 cars, the No. 24 Kondo Racing Nissan and the No. 19 Racing Project Bandoh Toyota were tenth and 11th, while the No. 3 Nissan brought up the rear, not running at all on the second day with a fresh chassis.

With private GT500 testing now complete, attention turns to the first of two official tests at Okayama on March 15-16, where the full 43-car field will gather for the first time.