MUGEN

2012.11.21

Japanese Championship Formula NIPPON

Hampered by bad weather TEAM MUGEN, and drivers Yamamoto and Sato end their seasons.

Event name: JAF Grand Prix SUPER GT & Formula NIPPON FUJI SPRINT CUP 2012
Course: 4.563km × 22 laps (100.386km)
Free: 2012-11-16 fri / Fine / Attendance 8,000 (Announcement from the organizer)
Qualifying: 2012-11-17 sat / Rainy / Attendance 19,000 (Announcement from the organizer)
Race: 2012-11-18 sun / Fine / Attendance 41,300 (Announcement from the organizer)

Though the 2012 Japanese Championship Formula NIPPON series ended at SUZUKA, the finale for the year was the non-Championship special event, the JAF Grand Prix SUPER GT Formula NIPPON FUJI SPRINT CUP 2012, which took place at Fuji International Speedway (Shizuoka Pref.). This event features not only the machines of Formula NIPPON, but also those of Super GT all come together for this season ending extravaganza. TEAM MUGEN were in full attendance with both #15 Takuma Sato and #16 Naoki Yamamoto. For ex-F1 and current Indy driver Takuma Sato this was his third JAF Grand Prix. TEAM MUGEN had high hopes for this race to bring a very good result.

[November 18th, (Sun)]
█ Race 1
#16 Naoki Yamamoto 8th place (22 laps: 32mins 31.248secs. / Best lap: 1min 27.760secs.)
#15 Takuma Sato 13th place (22 laps: 32mins 43.935secs. / Best lap: 1min 28.307secs)

Contrary to the day before the weather at Fuji International Speedway for the race was fine. TEAM MUGEN, considering conditions in previous day, tuned their machine to resolve the issues found out at the free run on dry road surface on Friday. Based on the feedback of both drivers and engineers, #15 and # 16 were each set up slightly differently, and with no free practice run scheduled in JAF Grand Prix, the drivers had no choice but to run the entire race with their initial settings. As the 22-lap sprint race is approximately 100km there is no need to exchange tires nor do fueling or make any other changes so, after their warming up run, all the cars were lined up on the dummy grid at 12:00. Air temperature was 15 °C and track surface temperature was 22 °C.

In a sprint race such as this, the result can often be determined by the situation at the start, but owing to the acute weather change for the official qualifying the previous day, the leading drivers were all stuck in the middle or latter part of the field and the final result was always in doubt. Both #15 Takuma Sato and #16 Naoki Yamamoto made good starts off the line, however, at the first corner, #15 Takuma Sato lost speed due to disturbance of another car, and #16 Naoki Yamamoto found himself out of position at the first corner which caused him to drop back down the field.
By the end of the first lap #15 Takuma Sato was in 8th place, with team-mate #16 Naoki Yamamoto in 14th. After that #15 Takuma Sato began to struggle with the balance of his machine and could not maintain his position, dropping back to finish 13th. However #16 Naoki Yamamoto on the other hand enjoyed a seesaw battle with the #31 machine and eventually finished in a creditable 8th place.

█ Comments from the representative Katsumata

This race was so influenced by weather. We really wanted to end this race with a better result, however, we were not able to find the set-up that would give us it. Even so, I believe #16 Naoki Yamamoto did good job and although #15 Takuma Sato could not show his real potential in terms of the final result, he at least gave us some quite useful data. Welcoming Takuma Sato as our team driver gave us a lot of important and precious data and his extensive racing experience gave us some very valuable feedback and comments. Also having two machines running together was extremely beneficial in terms of machine setting and so on. We plan to utilize this data and experience to get better results next season.
We highly appreciate the support of our sponsors and all our fans who cheered for us throughout this 2012 series - Thank you very much.

♦ Photo Gallery for Takuma Sato

♦ Photo Gallery for Naoki Yamamoto