Race report

Super Formula Suzuka

Suzuka Super Formula: Miyata gets first win, Nojiri crashes out

Ritomo Miyata pulled off a late pass on Sho Tsuboi to win a thrilling Super Formula race at Suzuka, as Tomoki Nojiri crashed out after contact with long-time leader Toshiki Oyu.

Jamie Klein

Edited: Apr 23, 2023, 11:57 AM

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TOM'S driver Miyata came from 12th on the grid to pass Tsuboi around the outside of Turn 1 on the penultimate lap of the 31-lap race to seal his first win in the Japanese single-seater category.

Miyata had vaulted into contention thanks to a safety car period that was called when Nojiri and Oyu came to blows on the latter driver's out lap, putting both in the barriers and out of the race.

Ryo Hirakawa made a late pass on Liam Lawson to finish third, completing an-all Toyota podium.

Story of the race

After an aborted start, owing to Dandelion Racing's Tadasuke Makino failing to get going from the grid, TGM Grand Prix poleman Oyu led the opening stages as Inging's Tsuboi and Nojiri settled into second and third places.

Lawson however was the driver on the move, jumping from eighth on the grid to fourth on the opening lap, and on the third lap he managed to clear Mugen team-mate Nojiri to move up to third.

Nojiri meanwhile appeared to be struggling, dropping another place to Kondo Racing man Kenta Yamashita.

When the pit window opened on lap 10, Lawson was first of the leaders to come in for his mandatory stop, followed by Tsuboi next time around.

Lawson came out behind Tsuboi and was unable to take advantage as the Inging driver got his tyres up to temperature.

Nojiri likewise pitted on lap 11, jumping back ahead of Yamashita in the process, but Oyu decided to delay his stop until lap 19, by which time Miyata had made his way up to second by virtue of staying out.

While Tsuboi and Lawson cleared Oyu with the undercut effect, Nojiri came out right behind the TGM driver and was looking for a way past as they entered the first sector.

But Nojiri made a grave misjudgement when he rear-ended Oyu at the Turn 5 left-hander, causing both cars to spear into the barriers and putting the two SUPER GT team-mates out of the race.

The subsequent safety car allowed Miyata and others, including Impul driver Hirakawa, to complete their pitstops with minimal time loss, but Tsuboi maintained the lead from Lawson, with Miyata slotting into third ahead of Hirakawa.

When the race resumed on lap 24, Lawson was immediately under pressure from Miyata on fresh tyres, with the TOM'S man getting the move done at Turn 1 at the start of the 26th lap to grab second.

Miyata then cruised up to the back of Tsuboi, and while the Inging driver had been saving his Overtake System allocation for the final showdown, he was powerless to resist an inspired Miyata, who got a superior run out of the chicane to set up a bold outside move at Turn 1 on lap 29.

From there, Miyata cruised to his first Super Formula win and a first in nearly two years for TOM'S by three seconds from Tsuboi.

At the same time as the lead battle was decided, Hirakawa passed Lawson for a third with a near-identical outside move to make it an all-Toyota podium - the first in Super Formula since 2020.

Yamashita had to be content with fifth place ahead of Sena Sakaguchi in the second Inging machine and Kazuto Kotaka, who scored his best finish in Super Formula yet with seventh for Kondo.

Giuliano Alesi (TOM'S), rookie Cem Bolukbasi (TGM) and Nirei Fukuzumi (ThreeBond) completed the points scorers.

Besides Nojiri and Oyu, the only other non-finisher was Nakajima Racing's Ren Sato, who suffered a technical problem shortly after the aborted start.

Nojiri maintains the lead of the championship on 42 points, with Miyata now his nearest challenger on 38 ahead of Lawson on 35.

Race results:

Cla # Driver Team Laps Gap 1 37 Japan Ritomo Miyata Vantelin Team TOM'S 30 2 38 Japan Sho Tsuboi JMS P.mu/cerumo-INGING 30 3.022 3 20 Japan Ryo Hirakawa ITOCHU ENEX TEAM IMPUL 30 3.404 4 15 New Zealand Liam Lawson Team Mugen 30 4.130 5 3 Japan Kenta Yamashita Kondo Racing 30 8.709 6 39 Japan Sena Sakaguchi JMS P.mu/cerumo-INGING 30 12.366 7 4 Japan Kazuto Kotaka Kondo Racing 30 13.071 8 36 France Giuliano Alesi Vantelin Team TOM'S 30 15.213 9 55 Turkey Cem Bolukbasi TGM Grand Prix 30 15.728 10 12 Japan Nirei Fukuzumi ThreeBond Racing 30 16.124 11 64 Japan Naoki Yamamoto TCS Nakajima Racing 30 16.662 12 50 Japan Nobuharu Matsushita B-Max Racing Team 30 18.095 13 14 Japan Kazuya Oshima docomo business ROOKIE 30 18.297 14 7 Japan Kamui Kobayashi Team KCMG 30 20.130 15 5 Japan Tadasuke Makino Japan Dandelion Racing 30 20.983 16 18 Japan Yuji Kunimoto Team KCMG 30 26.393 17 6 Kakunoshin Ota Japan Dandelion Racing 30 26.897 18 51 United Kingdom Raoul Hyman B-Max Racing Team 30 34.337 19 19 Japan Yuhi Sekiguchi ITOCHU ENEX TEAM IMPUL 29 1 Lap 20 53 Japan Toshiki Oyu TGM Grand Prix 19 11 Laps 21 1 Japan Tomoki Nojiri Team Mugen 19 11 Laps 22 65 Japan Ren Sato TCS Nakajima Racing 0 View full results

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