Manager Bando Masataka, who is a representative of TOYOTA GAZOO Racing's TEAM WedsSport BANDOH, has participated in the Super GT GT500 class, a top category in Japan, and continues to take on various challenges as a young businessman. Coach Masa will write about what he finds interesting and what he is working on in his daily races and his business career!
The 45th column in the series looks back on the battle of the No. 19 WedsSport ADVAN GR Supra at the 3rd round of the 2025 Super GT, held at the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia from June 26th to 28th. We will deliver the back of the race, which finished fifth from the pole position, with the throttle open fully open.
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Osu! This is Bando Masa. The Super GT was held in Sepang, Malaysia for the first time in 12 years. Did you enjoy the race on the spot or on the broadcast? My thoughts on this overseas match were “It was fun!” “is.
Let's take a look back at the race. As you know, car No. 19 WedsSport took the pole position in three years in qualifying, the first time in qualifying since SUGO, the 6th round of 2022.
In Q1, Kunimoto Yusuke was in charge of the second consecutive race from the previous race Fuji, and in Sepang he passed Q1 with top time. He entrusted Q2 to Sakaguchi Harunami, and took the lead by scoring a time of 1 minute 49.748 seconds, the only time he could update the course record, which was in the 1 minute 49 seconds range. Both of them had a great attack!
This Malaysian tournament was scheduled for the second time on Thursday, June 26th, as there were drivers with little experience in running Sepang, with the second official practice session and the qualifying round on Friday the 27th, and the final race was scheduled for Saturday the 28th.
In that respect, there were some key parts that were the first run of the official practice session on the first day. The reason is that the second official practice session on Friday is running in the morning, so the condition of the first official practice session held on Thursday evening will be at roughly the same time as the qualifying round.
For this reason, the first official practice session was a very important time. However, the grip on the road was extremely low, so my time had dropped from the off-season test for about 2-3 seconds after starting to run.
The low road grip made me think, “Hmm, that's a problem,” but all cars were in the same condition and had no time. Car No. 19 WedsSport entrusted Chief Engineer Nakayama Masaru to how to proceed with the setup.
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