» Super Formula: Sekiguchi charges to victory

It doesn’t seem that a round of the Japanese Super Formula or Super GT Championships can happen without a major downpour in the ‘land of the rising sun’. This was again the case at the second round of the Super Formula Championship at Autopolis, where heavy rain forced qualifying to be postponed to Sunday morning.

The 40-minute session to determine the grid order was red-flagged no less than three times, leaving little time for the drivers to get in a clean lap. Yuji Kunimoto (Kondō Racing Toyota) took pole for the main race, with Sho Tsuboi (JMS P.mu/cerumo・INGING) and Nirei Fukuzumi (Dandelion Racing Honda) taking second and third on the grid respectively.

Nick Cassidy (TOM’S Toyota), the New Zealander who won the season-opening race at Suzuka, didn’t have such a good time and qualified tenth and defending champion Naoki Yamamoto (Dandelion Racing Honda) was also having a hard time, qualifying in 15th.

The race started under windy conditions with rain being evident. On Lap 2, several of the cars pitted in order to get the mandatory tyre change out of the way and take advantage of an early Safety Car brought out by the retirement of Red Bull protégé Dan Ticktum who had crashed his Team Mugen Honda entry.

This spelled disaster for Team Mugen, as Ticktum’s teammate Tomoki Nojiri had stalled earlier in the race and couldn’t get off the grid; he spent the rest of the race at the back of the pack.

The fourth lap also marked the end for the #7 Sunoco Team LeMans of Artem Markelov, who had missed the start of the race while mechanics completed repairs on his car which had been wrecked in a qualifying smash. The Russian tried to re-enter the race, however an issue with the car’s steering led him to crash into the barriers at the exit of the pits.

The Safety Car left the track on Lap 6, allowing the race to finally get underway again. As soon as the race began, Tadasuke Makino (Nakajima Racing Honda) moved into third, while Nick Cassidy had slipped back to 16th, where he slowly crawled his way up to 10th over the next 30 laps.

At Lap 22, Yuhi Sekiguchi was leading the race, with Kunimoto in second and Makino still sitting in 3rd. Defending series champion Yamamoto had fought his way to fifth place, having started from a lowly 16th. Sekiguchi had gained a substantial lead of 19 seconds the rest of the field by this point in the race and looked to have the race in his pocket.

By Lap 35, Sekiguchi had increased his lead to 30 seconds, being ‘followed’ by Makino whilst Yamamoto continued his charge and now ran in third, 10 seconds behind Makino.

Pole-sitter Kunimoto had slipped to fourth, due to a bizarre pit strategy by which he hadn’t pitted yet for the mandatory tyre change, leaving his rubber absolutely stripped by his point. He was effectively holding up the pack, letting the top three drivers run off with the podium.

From laps 40-50 it was Nick Cassidy’s turn to hold up the pack, as he sat in tenth place, setting both his fastest lap of the race and a series of slower laps that held up the pack of drivers behind him.

On Lap 50, Sekiguchi sacrificed his lead to complete his mandatory pit stop. The circuit had dried up significantly, allowing him to switch to the less sticky medium Yokohama tyre. Whilst in the pits he was overtaken by Makino, who was still yet to pit. By Lap 52, Sekiguchi had regained the lead and lead by 7 seconds over Yamamoto, who moved up a place as Makino finally made his way into the pits.

A particularly slow pit stop cost Makino a spot on the podium, who finished the race in fourth.

Sekiguchi claimed an incredible race win, having started from sixteenth place. Yamamoto – who started from 17th – finished in second place, while Kazuya Oshima (Team LeMans Toyota) completed the podium having started from eleventh.

2019 Super Formula Championship Autopolis – Final Classification
	Driver	Team / Entry	Laps	Result	Pts
1.	Yuhi Sekiguchi	Itochu Enex Team Impul	53	1:30:29.891	10
2.	Naoki Yamamoto	DoCoMo Team Dandelion Racing	53	+ 3.633	8
3.	Kazuya Oshima	UOMO Sunoco Team LeMans	53	+ 7.374	6
4.	Tadasuke Makino	TCS Nakajima Racing	53	+ 17.594	5
5.	Nirei Fukuzumi	DoCoMo Team Dandelion Racing	53	+ 18.739	4
6.	Álex Palou	TCS Nakajima Racing	53	+ 29.782	3
7.	Kenta Yamashita	Kondō Racing	53	+ 30.774	2
8.	Nick Cassidy	Vantelin Team TOM’S	53	+ 32.443	1
9.	Hiroaki Ishiura	JMS P.mu/cerumo・INGING	53	+ 34.058
10.	Kamui Kobayashi	Carrozzeria Team KCMG	53	+ 34.577
11.	Lucas Auer	B-MAX with Motopark	53	+ 35.479
12.	Sho Tsuboi	JMS P.mu/cerumo・INGING	53	+ 38.130
13.	Kazuki Nakajima	Vantelin Team TOM’S	53	+ 38.287
14.	Ryo Hirakawa	Itochu Enex Team Impul	53	+ 48.610
15.	Koudai Tsukakoshi	Real Racing	53	+ 56.082
16.	Yuji Kunimoto	Kondō Racing	53	+ 1:07.508	1
17.	Harrison Newey	B-MAX with Motopark	52	1 lap behind
18.	Tomoki Nojiri	Team Mugen	52	1 lap behind
	Not Classified	Team / Entry	Laps	Reason
DNF.	Dan Ticktum	Team Mugen	1	Accident
DNF.	Artem Markelov	UOMO Sunoco Team LeMans	0	Suspension

Post Race Penalties:

None

Championship Points:

Championship points are awarded on the results of the race to the top-eight finishers on a 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 sliding scale.
Yuji Kunimoto earned 1 bonus championship point for securing pole position.

Images via Motorsport.com