Super GT 2010: Round 1 Results

22Mar10

The season opener of the 2010 Super GT season is now in the books! Super GT is Japan’s premier Grand Touring car racing league which showcases the best of Japan’s automotive engineering. New this season is a completely redesigned successor to Honda’s NSX deemed the HSV-10 GT. The HSV, short for Honda Sports Velocity, sports a completely redesigned chassis and a naturally aspirated 3.4 liter V8 which pumps out over 500 horsepower. Competing with the new HSV in the GT500 class are the established powerhouses of the Nissan GT-R (previous Super GT champion) and Lexus SC430. The HSV, to the surprise of many, failed to deliver a win in its inaugural race and was bested by the HIS Advan Kondo GT-R. Unfortunate collisions between two HSV’s as well as a light that caused another HSV to slide off the track all but extinguished Honda’s hope for the top spot on the day.

In the GT300 class, the RE AMEMIYA SGC7 (based on the Mazda RX-7 base) took first place after beginning the race in the pole position. The GT300 class is much more stiffly regulated than the GT500 class and consists of cars more closely resembling their commercially available counterparts such as the Porsche 911 GT3 RS, Lexus IS350, Lamborghini Gallardo, and Nissan 350Z.

The following is a video by Best Motoring that gives a little bit of insight into the Super GT series. Best Motoring is one of my favorite auto-related programs and is an incredible source of information concerning not only JDM model cars but European and American cars as well.