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The Super Taikyu Organisation (STO) has announced the provisional entry list for the 2024 Eneos Super Taikyu Series Empowered by Bridgestone, which features an impressive 69 cars across all nine classes.
Ranging from GT3 and GT4 customer sportscars to TCR touring cars, JDM production vehicles, and innovative manufacturer-developed concept cars, this year’s list of full-time and part-time entries reflects the vehicular diversity of the series.
2024 PROVISIONAL ENTRY LIST >>
The top class, ST-X, only features six GT3 cars. At present, two Mercedes-AMG GT3s are confirmed: The championship-winning #1 Zhongsheng ROOKIE Racing AMG (Ryuta Ukai/Giuliano Alesi/Naoya Gamou/Tatsuya Kataoka), and the #23 TKRI AMG (Daisuke Matsunaga/Yuya Motojima/Yuhki Nakayama). There is also the #31 apr Lexus RC F GT3 (Hiroaki Nagai/Kazuto Kotaka/Miki Koyama/Koki Saga), which was the only ST-X car that took part in last week’s pre-season test at Sportsland Sugo.
As revealed by Nissan in February, GTNET Motor Sports and Team Daishin will enter the #81 Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 for Noboyuki Oyagi, and a cast of co-drivers to be revealed later. The details of two additional ST-X entries will also be announced at a later date.
In ST-Z (GT4) there are an impressive 15 registered entries representing at least five different manufacturers.
At present, four Toyota GR Supra GT4 Evos will take part, led by defending series champions Saitama Green Brave (#52, Manabu Yamazaki/Hiroki Yoshida/Naoki Hattori/Seita Nonaka), and last year’s runner-up SHADE Racing (#885, Hiro Hayashi/Katsuyuki Hiranaka/Eijiro Shimizu). Team Noah will also return with its #75 GR Supra and the new #59 will be run by a new team backed by GR Garage Yamaguchi-Shunan. Both teams have yet to announce their 2024 driver line-ups.
Nissan will counter with three of its updated Z NISMO GT4s. Team Impul enters the #20 (Yuki Tanaka/Kazuki Hiramine/Kazuki Oki), and Team ZeroOne has expanded to a two-car ST-Z effort with the #25 (Tadao Uematsu/Tsugio Matsuda/Kimiya Sato/Teppei Natori) joining the #26 (Ryuichiro Otsuka/Ryuichiro Tomita/Takuro Shinohara/Seiji Ara).
After a 14-year partnership with Audi, Hitotsuyama Racing will become one of Mercedes-AMG’s three customer ST-Z teams, entering the #21 Mercedes-AMG GT4 (Daisuke Yamawaki/Sean Walkinshaw/James Pull/Shintaro Kawabata). Returning from last season are a restructured Buzz Progress Racing team with its #111 Mercedes (Nagayasu Miyagi/Max Salo/Sota Ogawa/Taiga Imoto), and AutoFactory with the #555 (Jun Tashiro/Shigehiro Ikemoto/Kazutaka Tokufuji/Go Nagata).
Porsche is represented by its two tenured ST-Z teams entering the latest version of the 718 Cayman GT4 RS Clubsport: The #19 of Birth Racing Project (Yuki Fujii/Takeshi Suehiro/Anna Inotsume/Kazuya Oshima [Neyagawa]), and the new-look #22 from Porsche Team EBI (Shota Kitazono/Rintaro Kubo/Naoya Yamano/Yugo Iwasawa).
And Techno First has ensured that at least one Audi R8 LMS GT4 will continue to race in Japan this year, the #34 (Masaki Kano/Riki Okusa/Hironobu Yasuda/Ryoma Henzan). Two more ST-Z entries will announce their plans at a later date.
ST-Q will expand to eight cars this year, all of which will use different types of renewable fuels. These cars are developed by Japan’s five largest automakers – Honda, Mazda, Nissan, Subaru, and Toyota.
Representing Honda, Team HRC will return with the #271 Honda Civic Type R CNF-R. It is one of several cars using 100% carbon-neutral synthetic fuel. Honda works driver Hiroki Otsu was announced as the first driver.
Mazda’s new in-house performance division Mazda Spirit Racing enters two cars: The #12 Mazda Roadster CNF Concept and the #55 Mazda3 Bio Concept, the latter of which runs on sustainable biodiesel fuel. Kazuhiro Terakawa, Yutaka Seki, Kaoru Ijiri, and – in a recent change – Mazda Executive Fellow Ikuo Maeda will drive the #55 Mazda3; Hiroshi Kawada, Yuui Tsutsumi, and Ryohei Sakaguchi will drive the #12 Roadster.
Nissan and NISMO will enter the #230 Nissan Z Racing Concept – which has served as the prototype for the Nissan Z GT4/NISMO GT4 models. Along with fellow Nissan factory drivers Daiki Sasaki, Kohei Hirate, and Mitsunori Takaboshi, Katsumasa Chiyo will join the NISMO Super Taikyu team.
Team SDA Engineering, representing Subaru, will begin the season with its #61 Subaru BRZ CNF Concept. Subaru engineers Kazuhiro Ito and Masafumi Hanazawa will drive alongside works drivers Takuto Iguchi and Hideki Yamauchi.
And Toyota will be represented by two teams and three different models. ORC ROOKIE Racing returns with the groundbreaking Toyota GR Corolla H2 Concept, embarking on its second season using liquid hydrogen fuel. Toyota Chairman of the Board Akio “Morizo” Toyoda will drive the #32 GR Corolla H2 Concept alongside Masahiro Sasaki, Hiroaki Ishiura, and Yasuhiro Ogura.
The #32 team plans to alternate between the GR Corolla and a version of the GR Yaris throughout the season.
ROOKIE Racing’s #28 GR86 CNF Concept will be driven by Eisuke Sasaki, Sho Tsuboi, Kazuya Oshima (Tomioka) and Daisuke Toyoda. ST-4 mainstay TOM’S Spirit is new to ST-Q, entering as GR Team Spirit. The team’s new #92 Toyota GR Supra Racing Concept – which is based on the GT4 model – made its debut at Sportsland Sugo. It will be driven by Keizo Kato, Takamitsu Matsui, Shunsuke Kohno, and Kenta Yamashita.
ST-TCR has three cars including two of the latest Honda Civic Type R TCRs. ST-1 has just one registered entry – K’s Frontier KTM Cars’ X-Bow GTX.
The four pure production classes consist of nine ST-2 cars (four Honda Civic Type Rs, two Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution Xes, and two Toyota GR Yaris), four ST-3s (two each of Nissan Fairlady Z34s and Lexus RC 350s), seven ST-4s (six Toyota GR86es and one Mazda Roadster RF) and 16 ST-5s.
The season begins on 20/21 April at Sportsland Sugo with a double-header of four-hour endurance races.
Feature image © STO
Author: RJ O’Connell
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Super Taikyu Series Reveals 69 Car Entry List For 2024 – dailysportscar.com
