Makino Puts Honda on Pole for SUPER GT Motegi Finale

Photo: SUPER GT

Tadasuke Makino took pole for Sunday's final round of the SUPER GT season at Motegi, and the result puts both main title contenders on the front row for the 250km race that decides the championship. Honda and Toyota will line up side by side at the front, with a single lap separating the two title rivals' best chances of taking the crown.

A late lap settles the front row

Makino didn't post his best time until the closing minutes of the 15-minute GT500 session. His 1:36.135 put the No. 100 Honda HRC Prelude-GT, which he shares with Naoki Yamamoto, 0.278 seconds clear of Kenta Yamashita's No. 36 TOM's Toyota GR Supra. That's the kind of margin that can disappear with one traffic-affected lap, which is why the timing of that run matters as much as the number itself.

The Team Kunimitsu pairing took over the points lead with a provisional fifth-place finish in the first race of the weekend. Pole adds a three-point cushion over Yamashita and Sho Tsuboi, who could only manage 10th on Saturday. Here's the thing: Kunimitsu doesn't need to win the race to hold the advantage, but a win by either front-row car would settle the title no matter what the other car does. That makes the start of Sunday's race unusually tense for both teams.

Honda has now taken a sixth consecutive GT500 pole. The car behind most of those streak poles, the Dunlop-shod Nakajima Racing entry, qualified third-fastest with Riki Okusa, 0.323 seconds off Makino's time. Yuto Nomura in the Real Racing car and Kakunoshin Ohta in the ARTA No. 8 completed a Honda lockout of the top five, so the grid's front end is almost entirely Honda, with Toyota's best hope sitting second.

Penalties reshape the midfield

Nirei Fukuzumi was sixth-fastest in the Rookie Racing Toyota, which was disqualified from second place in the opening race and is provisionally pending appeal. Behind him, Katsumasa Chiyo led the Nissan Z NISMO contingent in the works No. 23 car. Saturday's race winner, the Team Impul Nissan, qualified ninth with Bertrand Baguette driving, just behind Toshiki Oyu's Cerumo Toyota.

Two cars at the sharp end of the field face grid-related setbacks of their own. Both the No. 37 TOM's Toyota, which qualified 12th, and the No. 16 ARTA Honda, which didn't complete a lap in qualifying, will serve five-second stop-and-hold penalties during the race for unauthorised engine changes made after Saturday's running. For a team chasing points, a five-second hold is a costly way to start, and it changes the strategy calculus for the whole stint.

JLOC takes its first GT300 pole since its title year

In GT300, JLOC secured its first pole since its title-winning 2024 campaign. Takashi Kogure set the pace in the No. 88 Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2, which he shares with former Formula 1 driver Daniil Kvyat. His 1:45.082 beat Ryuichiro Tomita's Gainer Nissan Z, the Saturday polesitter, by just 0.067 seconds. Margins that tight usually reflect a grid where the top several cars are separated by tenths, and track position will matter a lot on Sunday.

The title fight in the class is tighter still. K-tunes Racing's hopes took a real step forward when Shinichi Takagi qualified the No. 96 Lexus RC F GT3 third, 0.088 seconds off the pole. Joao Paulo de Oliveira, however, struggled to 17th in the Kondo Racing Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3. Nine points separate the two K-tunes and Kondo cars. If Takagi and Morio Nitta win Sunday's race, de Oliveira and co-driver Iori Kimura would need to finish second to take the title. That's a scenario that depends heavily on the first lap and on whatever the Kondo car can recover from 17th.

Sven Mueller, third in the standings, has a 13-point deficit to make up. He qualified 12th in the Seven x Seven Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo, which means a long recovery drive is likely if he wants a shot at the title. Hideki Yamauchi's Subaru BRZ and Shunsuke Kohno's Lexus LC500 completed the top five. Ritomo Miyata was a strong seventh in the CarGuy MKS Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo, which was repaired overnight after a start crash on Saturday. Rookie Racing's new GR GT3 concept, driven by Tokiya Suzuki, qualified 23rd, four places better than its Saturday effort but still 1.709 seconds off the pace.

What to watch on Sunday

The race starts at 2 p.m. local time at Motegi, which is 12 a.m. ET. The GT500 field has two cars that can clinch the title outright from the front row, while the GT300 title hinges on a handful of results that depend on starts and incidents that haven't happened yet. My read is that Honda's grid advantage gives Kunimitsu a strong hand, but Toyota's second-place car will look to be the one that spoils it at the first corner. The five-second penalties could also be the deciding factor in a race where a single pit-stop mistake can cost a title.

RESULTS: GT500/GT300