On Sunday May 4, SUPER GT held its traditional Golden Week endurance round at Fuji Speedway. In front of a total of 82,500 fans, Toshiki Oyu / Hiroaki Ishiura (KeePer Cerumo GR Supra) took a commanding victory in the GT500 class – the first for the team in six years. In GT300, Roberto Merhi / Yoshiaki Katyama (Uni-Robo Bluegrass Ferrari 296 GT3) celebrated Ferrari’s first victory in the series since 2009 after starting from P27 on the grid following a heartbreaker of a finish that saw the leading Subaru BRZ R&D Sport stop on track with an engine failure on the very last lap.
Ahead of the 3-hour endurance classic, GTA chairman Masaaki Bandoh talked about a variety of topics in a one-hour long press conference, among them the next-gen GT500 regulations, the upcoming comeback in Malaysia and his personal wish to see GT500 cars compete at the Le Mans 24 Hours as well as the idea to hold a GT500-only race at the World Endurance Championship (WEC) Fuji round in the future.
– GTA chairman Masaaki Bandoh has announced that the next-generation GT500 vehicle regulations are now scheduled to be introduced in 2030. Originally planned for 2028, they have been delayed to 2029 last year. Now they are set to be introduced in 2030. The GTA is a bit frustrated how long the process is taking, thus wants to finalize the plans by 2026, so that the design phase can start in 2027. The whole process takes about five years. Bandoh highlighted that all three GT500 manufacturers (Toyota, Honda, Nissan) have to be in agreement and that various questions have to be discussed such as if for example hybrids are being used. At last year’s Suzuka finale, Bandoh expressed in the press conference that he wasn’t keen on introducing hybrids but would go with what the manufacturers prefer.
On that topic, Bandoh got asked if there’s a chance of the naturally aspirated V8 engines of the past returning following the discussions in Formula 1 discussing to potentially bring back V10 engines. While Bandoh thinks that the naturally aspirated engines would make for a more “interesting event”, he also stated that they have to consider the costs. The currently used engine format called NRE (Nippon Race Engine) is a 2L inline 4-cylinder turbo engine used in common with SUPER FORMULA is just “too good” as Bandoh explained. Further developing the current engine means that the costs will eventually come down. It’s difficult to surpass the current engine formula, so no talks are being held about introduce a next-gen engine, Bandoh confirmed.
– Bandoh once again confirmed the plans for SUPER GT’s Fuji summer round (Round 4, August 2-3) to be held as a “Sprint Weekend”. The chairman explained that there won’t be any running on Friday. Both GT500 and GT300 will hold two races each. One as a regular multi-class race and one where the GT500 and GT300 grids will be split to run separately. Both drivers will run one race each. No success weight will be used.
Bandoh also expressed his wish to use the so-called “Indy-style Start”, which was used for the SUPER GT x DTM Fuji Dream Race in 2019. It sees a close formation double file start, where overtaking is allowed the moment the green flag drops. Usually, overtaking in SUPER GT is only allowed after the start line got crossed, meaning the rules would have to get changed for the Fuji Sprint event. The GTA is currently discussing this topic. Further details will be announced at a later point.
– SUPER GT boss Bandoh commented on the rumors that various delays are apparently putting the third round and long-awaited comeback in Sepang, Malaysia in June in jeopardy. The GTA chairman confirmed that there have been a variety of issues such as travel arrangements (flights, hotels etc.) being delayed for the people involved. However, Bandoh insisted that the race will take place as scheduled while also apologizing to the entrants about the delays and concerns.
Bandoh underlined that the GTA signed a three-year contract with the tourism board in Malaysia. The logistics of the event including the travel and accommodation arrangements have been left to the local promoter, Bandoh explained. People from Sepang International Circuit were at Fuji Speedway this weekend to resolve the issues. This is the first year of the three-year contract, so despite the issues, he’s confident that they will have something properly established going forward.
– In addition of the staff of Haro Sports (the Malaysian promoter) and Sepang International Circuit, guests from Saudi Arabia have been at Fuji Speedway this weekend to inspect the event. There are currently no concrete plans to hold a race in Saudi Arabia, but it’s no secret that the country is interested in hosting a variety of sports events alongside Formula 1.
– This year, SUPER GT has adopted a time penalty system. At the Okayama season opener, time penalties between 5 and 10 seconds were handed out. After the race, several drivers, teams as well as fans expressed their opinion on this. Bandoh explained that they want to use time penalties as a middle ground between black-and-white warning flags and drive-through penalties and that it can be used in a flexible way for “lighter violations” other than contact (at Okayama it was used for contact and pushing another driver off the track). Depending on the severity of the violation, drive-through penalties will still be handed out. But with time penalties, the GTA hopes to hand out penalties for lighter violations that don’t immediately ruin the entire race for one team, as a drive-through can cost about 40 seconds.
– Lastly, Bandoh once again expressed his personal wish to see a GT500 car competing at the Le Mans 24 Hours, for example as a Garage 56 entry. He’s been proposing this idea for many years now. While potentially introducing hydrogen engines could lead to the GTA and ACO working together, Bandoh stressed that the chances of a GT500 car running at Le Mans is currently very slim. “I may sound like a child, but I always said I wanted to see a GT500 car compete at Le Mans one day.”
That being said, Bandoh expressed various ideas to work together with the ACO and SRO. For example, the SUPER GT boss openly theorized about the the idea of perhaps holding a GT500-only race at the WEC Fuji round. In addition, he confirmed that SRO boss Stéphane Ratel wants to make an announcement at this year’s Suzuka 1000km for 2026. Bandoh talked about an idea of perhaps holding a GT300-only race at the Suzuka 1000km in the future.
The reason for Bandoh’s thought process are the scorching summer temperatures in Japan. He explained that while finalizing next year’s calendar until June, they have to think about whether they want to even hold a race in August or perhaps move the August rounds to the somewhat cooler Tohoku region. This could also be accomplished by working together with the ACO / FIA and SRO by for example holding a GT500-only race at the WEC Fuji round and a GT300-only race at the Suzuka 1000km. However, this requires working together with other championships and governing bodies holding events in Japan. Bandoh stressed this is currently just an idea. “But it can’t happen, if you don’t talk about.”
Copyright Photos: GT Association (GTA)
