Nissan tops opening Fuji Super GT test day by 0.018s

Nissan held a 1-2-3 stranglehold during the opening hours of the afternoon session, before #100 Team Kunimitsu Honda’s Naoki Yamamoto went quickest of all with a time of 1m28.797s.

Kenta Yamashita managed to shade it by a tenth in the #19 Bandoh Lexus, before All-Japan F3 champion Takaboshi set a breathtaking 1m28.055s lap to move atop the leaderboard.

Yamashita, who shares the #19 Lexus with 2016 Super Formula champion Yuji Kunimoto, responded immediately with another flyer, but fell short of the top spot by just 0.018s.

The #6 Team LeMans Lexus of Kazuya Oshima and Felix Rosenqvist was only 0.055s adrift in third, with Oshima setting the fastest time of the two.

The #23 NISMO duo of Tsugio Matsuda and Ronnie Quintarelli finished nearly half a second behind in fourth, with Kazuki Nakajima and Yuhi Sekiguchi another tenth adrift in the #36 TOM’S.

Formula 1 2009 champion Jenson Button managed to improve on teammate Yamamoto’s earlier flyer to position Team Kunimitsu’s NSX-GT sixth in the timesheets and the fastest of all Honda runners.

The #387 Zent Lexus of Yuji Tachikawa and Hiroaki Ishoura was seventh, only 0.020s quicker than the  #64 Impul Nissan pairing of Daiki Sasaki and Jann Mardenborough.

Last year’s Suzuka 1000km winners Bertrand Baguette and Kosuke Matsuura were next up in the #64 Nakajima Honda, while the top 10 was completed by defending champions Nick Cassidy and Ryo Hirakawa (#1 TOM’S Lexus).

Of the 15 GT500 cars, 12 were separated by just one second, with only the Hondas run by Real Racing, Mugen and ARTA not making the cut.

The opening Fuji test day was interrupted several times, with the ARTA squad causing one of the red flags in the afternoon.