Suzuka SUPER GT: Hirate bags pole for Kondo Nissan

With zero success ballast on board, the #24 Nissan Z shared by Hirate and Daiki Sasaki looked like a contender for pole from the start of the weekend, with Sasaki setting the pace in Saturday morning practice.

Sasaki was at the wheel for Q1, going second-fastest behind the Racing Project Bandoh Toyota of Sena Sakaguchi, but in the Q2 pole shootout Hirate was the driver to beat with a best time of 1m44.320s.

That was enough to best the #36 TOM'S Toyota GR Supra of Sho Tsuboi by 0.265s, albeit with the Toyota carrying 40kg of success ballast from its victory in last month's Fuji race.

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Yuji Kunimoto couldn't match the pace of Sakaguchi from Q1 and was only able to go third-fastest, a little under a tenth slower than Tsuboi.

Honda's top representative was the Team Kunimitsu NSX-GT in fourth place, with Naoki Yamamoto at the wheel, while reigning champion Bertrand Baguette put the Team Impul Nissan in fifth.

Completing the Q2 order were the SARD Toyota of Yuichi Nakayama and two more Hondas, the #16 ARTA car of Hiroki Otsu and the #17 Real Racing machine of Nobuharu Matsushita.

Best of the cars to miss the Q2 cut was the championship-leading #23 NISMO Nissan of Ronnie Quintarelli in ninth place, despite carrying the Italian driver carrying the maximum 50kg of success ballast.

Tomoki Nojiri, back from the collapsed lung that stopped him from taking part in the most recent round of Super Formula, was a disappointing 12th-fastest in the #8 ARTA Honda, one place ahead of the #3 NISMO car of Katsumasa Chiyo.

Subaru turns around fortunes with GT300 pole

GT300 pole went to the works Subaru BRZ, as Hideki Yamauchi posted a laptime of 1m55.775s aboard the car he shares with Takuto Iguchi in the Q2 pole shootout.

#61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT

Photo by: Masahide Kamio

That was enough to beat Ryuichiro Tomita in the best of the Gainer Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3s by a little over three tenths of a second.

A trio of Toyota machines completed the top five, with the LM Corsa Toyota GR Supra taking third ahead of the Inging GR86 and the Tsuchiya Engineering Supra.

The Fuji-winning Kondo Nissan of Joao Paulo de Oliveira and Teppei Natori was an impressive ninth-fastest with its 66kg of success ballast, three places clear of the LEON Mercedes-AMG GT3 (Naoya Gamou/Takuro Shinohara) which carries the most ballast in the GT300 field with 72kg.

Apr's brand-new Lexus LC500h topped its Q1 group courtesy of Kazuto Kotaka, but team-mate Koki Saga could only manage 11th on the grid in Q2.

Among the cars to drop out in Q1 were the Goodsmile Racing Mercedes, which starts down in 17th, and the Saitama Toyopet Toyota Supra after a spin for Kohta Kawaai that has left the car a lowly 20th.

GT500 qualifying results: