Super GT – Baguette and Matsuura win the Suzuka 1000km with Honda

Honda won the Suzuka 1000km, the flagship event of Super GT, for the first time since 2013. The Japanese manufacturer celebrated this success with the NSX-GT from the Nakajima team driven by Betrand Baguette and Kosuke Matsuura who took the lead after the penultimate salvo of supplies.

The #64 Honda completed the 171 laps of the Suzuka circuit, taking the checkered flag a dozen seconds ahead of the #23 Nissan GT-R of Tsugio Matsuda and Ronnie Quintarelli. The official team took advantage of the retirement of the No. 17 Real Racing Honda entrusted to Koudai Tsukakoshi and Takashi Kogure, the victim of a puncture sending him into the barriers at Spoon.

The #100 Honda of Team Kunimitsu of Naoki Yamamoto and Takuya Izawa completed the podium, notably thanks to a maneuver by the former on the #1 Lexus of Team SARD of Heikki Kovalainen and Kohei Hirate in the final laps. The Japanese went off the track a few moments later to Degner, giving 4th place to the No. 19 WedsSport Bandoh Lexus entrusted to Kamui Kobayashi, Yuji Kunimoto and Yuhi Sekiguchi.

Joao Paulo de Olivieira and Daiki Sasaki, poleman for the Suzuka 1000km in the #24 Kondo Racing Nissan, completed the top five ahead of the #37 Lexus from the Tom's team of Ryo Hirakawa and Nick Cassidy.

Jenson Button took 12th place in the No. 16 Mugen Honda he shared with Hideki Mutoh and Daisuke Nakajima. The crew's race was disrupted by a drive-through for a dangerous maneuver in the pits. The old pilot McLaren then received another sanction for overtaking under safety car regime before the crew suffered two punctures.

In GT300, victory went to the Mercedes AMG GT3 n°65 of Haruki Kurosawa and Naoya Gamou who beat the Toyota GT86 VivaC by Takamitsu matsui, Kenta Yamashita and Tsubasa Kondo.

Discover the report of the Suzuka 1000km produced by our special correspondent in issue 2129 of AUTOhebdo, available from Monday evening in digital version on all platforms, and from Wednesday on newsstands.