Super Formula round 10 recap: Rookie of the Year grabs his maiden win and Nakajima Racing’s first in three years

Written by Tarun Suresh

Credit: Super Formula

Round 10 was initially scheduled to be held at the Fuji International Speedway, but was cancelled due to intense fog, which heavily hampered visibility on track. A replacement race was scheduled for the season finale weekend at Suzuka, held on the morning before round 12. It would be using the grid from the qualifying session held at Fuji.

That meant Tadasuke Makino would be starting on pole with Igor Fraga in second. Kakunoshin Ohta and Ayumu Iwasa would take the second row, and Tomoki Nojiri rounded off the top five. The championship leader, Sho Tsuboi would only start seventh.

Fraga, starting second, took the lead at the start with the brilliant overtake around the outside of turn two.

With no mandatory pit stops and strategy out of the picture, this was one of the more uneventful races. The action was mostly isolated to the lower ranks of the field, with the top ten remaining unchanged after lap one till the chequered flag.

The race was yet another showing of Honda dominance at Suzuka. The top six were all running Honda engines.

The Rookie of the Year, Igor Fraga, crossed the finish line first, grabbing Nakajima Racing’s first win in three years. This was also the first win in three years for a team besides Team Dandelion, Team Mugen and Team TOM’S.

Fraga embracing team boss and Japanese racing legend Satoru Nakajima | Credit: Super Formula

The dandelions of Makino and Ohta finished second and third, respectively. Iwasa will be frustrated with fourth, the first full race finish where he failed to stand on the podium. Nojiri put himself out of title contention after coming in fifth.

Ren Sato was the last of the Hondas in the points in sixth. Tsuboi was the highest-placed Toyota driver with a seventh-place finish. He held off Toshiki Oyu in eighth. Nirei Fukuzumi finished ninth. Kazuya Oshima, on his penultimate race, finished in the points yet again.

Tsuboi had a nice buffer of 16.5 points to second in the championship heading into round 10, and has maintained that lead; although, it has been shortened to 9.5 points. The dandelion duo of Makino and Ohta are tied for second with 107 points each. Ayumu Iwasa is three points behind in fourth.

Iwasa will start round 12 on pole. Ohta and Makino will start fourth and fifth, respectively, and Tsuboi will start seventh.

Team Dandelion seems to have one hand on the Teams’ Championship trophy, 31 points ahead of Team Mugen in second, with 35 points up for grabs in the season finale, round 12.