Podium Finish for Nissan Z After Fierce Pursuit
JGTC Rd.5 MOTEGI GT CHAMPION RACE Race Report
Twin Ring Motegi (Tochigi, Japan) - August 4-5, 2004
Round 5 of All Japan GT Championship (JGTC) was held on September 5 (Sun) at Twin Ring Motegi (4.801km/lap) in Tochigi prefecture. Xanavi NISMO Z (#1) started from 2nd after qualify and finished the race in 3rd place going through poor weather conditions with many cars involved in accidents. The drivers Satoshi Motoyama and Richard Lyons won further points to benefit in the Championship standings towards consecutive titles.
42 cars started from the 63 lap race at 2:00pm when the formation lap began. The weather was cloudy with temperature of 23(C). The track was wet from the rain since the morning and further heavy rain was forecast. The poor track conditions made tire choice critical for all teams, but eventually most of GT500 cars selected intermediate tires to start the race.
Satoshi Motoyama was the starting driver on #1 Z, keeping his original position for first few laps. By 15 minutes after the race began, the track started to dry but Motoyama made the best use of the tire to keep the pace. On lap 9, a Supra (#35) ran off track and Motoyama suddenly grabbed the lead. Still, the track continued to dry and Motoyama struggled to maintain the grip of the tires. On lap 12, Motoyama let go of the top position and decided to keep the best of the tires without dropping out from the race. The car pitted on lap 26 and Lyons took over the wheels and changed to slick tires. The car was 7th after all cars pitted, but with the race leaders experiencing problems and Lyons in pursuit, the car reached 5th in lap 36 and 4th in lap 37. Lyons gradually filled the gap between the car ahead and 20 seconds gap was filled and on lap 56 he took over to be 3rd. He then pushed even further and on the last few laps, he was right behind 2nd place which was only 3 seconds behind the top. The car did not succeed in taking over further positions, and the car received the checkered flag on lap 63. The final battle by Lyons was enjoyed by the thousands of Nissan fans that traveled from across the Kanto region to see the race.
MOTUL PITWORK Z (#22) bore 100kg handicap weight had Masami Kageyama started the race from 13th place. Although the car promoted positions by two on the opening lap, with too much force, the car ran out to the gravels on second lap. With losing positions, the car made laps in 13th place. After switching to Michael Krumm and to slick tires on lap 31, the car recovered its momentum and when other cars started to fall, Krumm kept the pace steady and promoted to 10th on lap 37 and 9th on lap 51 and 8th on lap 54 to finish the race after 63 laps.
CALSONIC IMPUL Z (#12) started from 6th and was 3rd when Benoit Treluyer passed the car to Yuji Ide. The car continued the fierce pursuit but hit GT300 car when driving in 5th place. The car suffered damage to the front tire and ran off track. With the tire punctured, the car could not get out of the gravel bed and was forced to retire.
G'ZOX SSR HASEMI Z (#3) started from 16th place and Toshihiro Kaneishi climbed to 9th but the car had damped on the second half when the track turned dry and Erik Comas had to put up with endurance. In the end, with the top cars falling out of race, the car managed to finish in 7th place.
NISMO Team Director, Hiroshi Degawa said, "It was a shame to miss the victory. Motoyama had put up with the bad track condition in the beginning and Lyons did a great job in the end. Nearly hitting with #3 when leaving the pit was close, but fortunately, we won 3rd place on the podium. I think the Championship will be very challenging through to Suzuka, but I think we know now how to approach the last two races. We thank the fans for their great support as always."
"It was very tough race this weekend," said Richard Lyons. "But I am very glad to have finished on the podium. I thank the team for working very hard and fans for their great support. I think the we have more chance in winning the Championship now."
"Since the car's handling was good, I was confident in winning the race today," said Satoshi Motoyama. "The first half was under very tough condition, though. Still, I am very glad to have finished 3rd place on the podium."
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RACE RESULTS
JGTC Rd.5 MOTEGI GT CHAMPION RACE - Sunday, 5 July, 2004
TWIN RING MOTEGI [ 14:00- 63Laps Rain-Cloudy / Wet-Dry ]
| Pos |
Car Name |
No. |
Driver Name |
Time/Diff. |
| 1 |
EPSON NSX |
32 |
Tsugio Matsuda / Andre Lotterer |
2:04:26.986 |
| 2 |
ESSO Ultraflo Supra |
6 |
Juichi Wakisaka / Akira Iida |
+1.069 |
| 3 |
Xanavi NISMO Z |
1 |
Satoshi Motoyama / Richard Lyons |
+2.514 |
| 4 |
DYNACITY TOM'S SUPRA |
37 |
James Courtney / Tatsuya Kataoka |
+14.957 |
| 5 |
WOODONE TOM'S SUPRA |
36 |
Takeshi Tsuchiya / Marco Apicella |
+41.410 |
| 6 |
DENSO SARD SUPRA GT |
39 |
Jeremie Dufour / Andre Couto |
+59.879 |
| 7 |
G'ZOX SSR HASEMI Z |
3 |
Toshihiro Kaneishi / Erik Comas |
+1:16.058 |
| 8 |
MOTUL PITWORK Z |
22 |
Masami Kageyama / Michael Krumm |
+1:18.782 |
| 9 |
RAYBRIG NSX |
100 |
Shinji Nakano / Hiroki Kato |
+1:46.066 |
| 10 |
au Cermo SUPRA |
38 |
Yuji Tachikawa / Seiji Ara |
+1:46.713 |
| R |
CALSONIC IMPUL Z |
12 |
Benoit Treluyer / Yuji Ide |
28Laps |
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TRACK INFORMATION
Length: 4,801.379m
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