Kyojo Cup: Can anyone match Rio Shimono?
- MARCO ALBERTINI
- 2 hours ago
- 3 min read
Rio Shimono, driving for Itochu Enex Impul with Dr.Dry, leads the standings heading into the second round of the all-female championship this weekend. The 25-year-old from Osaka took pole and won both races in the season-opening round back in May, taking maximum points in the first weekend of the series' KYOJO Formula era.
As Kyojo Cup returns to action this weekend at Fuji, the question frequently being asked in the paddock is - can anyone match Rio Shimono?
Impul with Dr.Dry's sole driver, Rio Shimono dominated the season opener two months ago, winning both races by over nine seconds, along with taking both fastest laps and pole position, thus scoring 33 points, the maximum possible over the course of a round.
Nine points behind Shimono sits 2022 series champion Miki Onaga. KCMG's highest-standing driver, Onaga finished second in both races to Shimono as she fended off two different drivers for the middle step of the podium. During the two month gap between rounds, Onaga contested three rounds of the Professional division of the GR86/BRZ Cup at Motegi, Sugo and Tokachi, taking a best result of 18th in the latter.
Also on the podium during the opening round were Mako Hirakawa and Kokoro Sato. Both drivers finished third and fourth in the two races, but Sato's podium in the Kyojo Final on Sunday granted more points, therefore she now sits third in the standings, two points ahead of Hirakawa.
The first round was also a difficult one for TOM'S. Despite Hana Burton's impressive front row start on Saturday, she wasn't able to convert it into a podium as she fell to sixth in the damp conditions. As Burton took more points on Sunday by finishing ninth, her teammate Aimi Saito, who finished a lowly 14th the previous day, gained seven places to end the weekend in seventh to score her fist points in her title-defending campaign.
Last year, Saito drove for Team M to her maiden Kyojo Cup title. Over the winter of 2025, Ai Miura's team rebranded to AiWin and its sole driver is one of Toyota's supported drivers in the series, Itsumo Shiraishi. The AiWin driver qualified seventh and ran as high as sixth before spinning out in damp conditions and falling out of the points in the first race. Shiraishi then rebounded to finish 10th the following day, gaining two places to take her first points of the season.
Finishing one place away from Shiraishi on Sunday was Riona Tomishita, who missed out on points in both races and is the highest-standing driver without points heading into this weekend. Struggling with car problems throughout the weekend, Tomishita finished ninth and 11th in both races, but enters the second round of the season with high hopes after taking an overall win in FCR Vita and taking fifth in her class at the Fuji 24 Hours since then.
On-track action will begin on Thursday as the first two practice sessions will be held at 13:20 and 16:30 local times respectively. Two more practice sessions are scheduled for the following day, at 8:50 and 14:40 on Friday.
Saturday's qualifying will be live streamed in both English and Japanese on the Inter Proto Series x Kyojo Cup YouTube channel at 7:55 local time (UTC+9), whilst the Kyojo Sprint will begin three hours later, at 10:55. The final race of the weekend, the Kyojo Final, will be contested at 12:40 on Sunday.