HASEMI TAKES DEBUT VICTORY IN SEPANG

2009-07-17 14:14:23 Author: admin Source:

26 June 2009-Round 4 of the 2009 AUTOBACS SUPER GT Series held at the Sepang International Circuit recently saw HASEMI TOMICA EBBRO GT-R's (Ronnie Quintarelli/Hironobu Yasuda) took their debut victory at the Sepang International Circuit in the GT500 class and the very first for the 2009 Championship season. In GT 300, I.M JIHAN CO. LTD APPLE Shiden driven by Hiroki Katoh and Hiroki Yoshimoto staged an furious charge from the very back of the pack to grab a surprising win.

The victory marked only Hasemi Motor Sports team's first of the year since Round 7 of the 2008 season. Nissan as the famed Super GT marque has thus far garnered three victories in the current Super GT season; the other victories were from the Kondo Racing and NISMO team in Rounds 1 and 3 respectively. Hasemi drivers R.Quintarelli secured his second career win in the series, while team mate H.Yasuda scored his debut win at Sepang. Yasuda was also the GT300 class drivers' Champion last season.

The racestart was scheduled at 16:00 (Malaysia Time) as drivers, teams' personnel and racequeens all had to bask in the midday Malaysian heat. When the grid lined-up after the formation lap, pole sitter MOTUL AUTECH GT-R were forced to start from the pitlane due to a mechanical problem, thus promoting HASEMI TOMICA EBBRO GT-R, second place on the grid, to start on pole and lead the rest of the GT500 cars. Hasemi's lead driver R.Quintarelli in the No.3 GT-R had no trouble holding off the GT500 machines for the overall lead and sailed on as the race leader as the field completed the first of fifty-four laps .
 
Quintarelli was quickly on cruise control from then on, and maintained a 2-second lead over second place runner No.18 ROCKSTAR DOME NSX (Takashi Kogure) until first series of pitstops on lap 30. At the stop, the driving duties was handed to team mate Hironobu Yasuda who was ordered to not relinquish the lead. A quick pitwork from the Hasemi crew allowed Yasuda to rejoin the race comfortably in the lead.  
 
Meanwhle, 2nd place man Ryo Michigami, who had resumed driving duties for No. 18, spun out after being bumped from behind by No. 12 IMPUL CALSONIC GT-R (Sebastien Philippe). The incident saw No.18 suffered a huge time deficit and car damages which invariably casted No. 18 out of the competition amongst the lead pack. No. 8 ARTA NSX (Ralph Firman/Takuya Izawa) was promoted to 2nd place for a brief moment as Izawa was unable to hold on to second place and fend off a strong charge from third place runners No. 17 KEIHIN NSX's Koudai Tsukakoshi. Tsukakoshi eventually passed Izawa for the final spot on the podium on the final stint of the race.

At the front, Hasemi's H.Yasuda continued his consistent pace and ran well in the lead, building a gap of 20-second lead to second place runners. With a handful of laps remaining, Yasuda was on his way to the chequered flag without any apparent challenges from contending GT500 teams with closest finisher and second place No. 17 KEIHIN NSX's Tsukakoshi almost 25 seconds away. KEIHIN NSX's Tsukakoshi drove a spirited race to secure the team's first podium of the season since a 3rd-place in the final round of the 2007 series at Suzuka and his first-ever podium spot in the series as well.
 
Third place went to the No. 8 ARTA NSX (Ralph Firman/Takuya Izawa). Starting from 5th, Firman kept 4th position during the first half of the race. Thanks in part to a 2-tyre change [instead of 4] strategy, No. 8 had climbed to 2nd position after the stops, but was eventually passed by Tsukakoshi in car No. 17 on the last curve of lap 48 for second place overall. 

The SUPER GT Teams' leader, No. 24 HIS ADVAN KONDO GT-R (Joao Paulo Lima de Oliveira/Seiji Ara), finished 5th. de Oliveira had climbed to 3rd position at one point, but was forced to pit early on lap 20 and dropped out of the lead pack in the first half of the race. Later, team mate S.Ara was unable to hold third, probably because due to the weight handicap induced on the team relative to their current results. However, six points gained from 5th-place finish was enough for KONDO Racing to keep the lead in the SUPER GT Teams' classifications. Other worthy finishers include; No. 1 MOTUL AUTECH GT-R (Satoshi Motoyama/Benoit Treluyer) who took 8th overall, maintaining 7th overall in the Super GT GT500 Drivers' rankings.

The winner of the GT300 race was No. 2 I.M JIHAN CO. LTD APPLE Shiden, however at racestart, the team were supposedly scheduled to start on pole, but due to a weight handicap infringement, they were penalized and forced to start from the very back of the grid. Hiroki Katoh, their starting driver, was aided in his effort to move up through the pack when a crash occurred on lap 1 that claimed several competitors in the mid-field. 

Katoh saw the opportunity and turned up the pace to move up to 10th position before completion of the first lap. From there, he continued to pass his rivals at a pace of about one car per lap until he stood in 3rd position by lap 9. Still charging, he then took 2nd position on lap 11, and pitted on lap 20 for fuel and drivers switch to Hiroki Yoshimoto who took the bull by its horns for the rest of the remaining laps to score the team's first victory since round 6 of the 2007 season, the Pokka 1000km (Suzuka). Second place fell to No. 9 WedsSport IS350 (Manabu Orido/Tatsuya Kataoka), whose 15 points moved the team up one position in the season ranking. Third went to No.7 M7 MUTIARA MOTORSAMEMIYASGC 7 (Nobuteru Taniguchi/Ryo Orime).

Former GT300 ranking leader No. 3 ARTA Garaiya (Morio Nitta/Shinichi Takagi) managed 10th at Sepang with its weight handicap load of 82kg and special performance-inhibiting handicap. The series lead now features M7 RE-AMEMIYA RACING team.

The upcoming Super GT race is scheduled for Sugo on 25-26 July.

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