Super Taikyu: Riona Tomishita secures maiden podium of the season at Motegi
- MARCO ALBERTINI
- 1 minute ago
- 3 min read
At the season-opening Motegi round of the Super Taikyu season, Riona Tomishita began her sophomore campaign in the series with a second-place finish in ST-2 in her #225 KTMS Toyota GR Yaris alongside Rin Arakawa and Kiyoshi Umegaki. Also in the field, Kazumi Mikami in ST-4, Nanami Tsukamoto in ST-5F and Hana Burton in ST-5R put on impressive performances and ran at the front of each class, but went unrewarded as all three hit mechanical issues.
Four months after last year's Fuji finale, Super Taikyu returned to action in last weekend's Motegi round, in which Riona Tomishita clinched a convincing ST-2 class podium to kick off her second year in the championship. During the weekend, Nanami Tsukamoto also helped her #822 AndLegal Racing crew take the ST-4 lead, whilst Hana Burton and Kazumi Mikami also contributed to their #120 Club Mazda Spirit Racing and #18 Asano Racing Service cars' strong runs, before all three were heartbreakingly forced to head back to the garage as mechanical problems hit all three cars.
As was the case last year, the weekend was split into two 4-hour races, in which ST-X, ST-Q and ST-1 were the only classes to compete in both races, whilst the remaining classes only partook in one of the two races. Saturday's race saw classes from ST-1 to ST-5R race, except ST-2, which took part in Sunday's closing enduro as well as ST-Z.
For the opening race of the weekend, three women were on the grid. 49-year-old Kazumi Mikami put her #18 Asano Racing Service Toyota GR86 ninth among the ST-4 entries, whilst Japanese-Brazilian Nanami Tsukamoto qualified an impressive second in ST-5F in her #822 AndLegal Racing Honda Fit3. Kyojo Cup regular Hana Burton was also on the grid, as she helped qualify her #120 Club Mazda Spirit Racing fifth in the ST-5R class in her second series appearance.
In the opening stages, the #120 Club Mazda Spirit Racing made its way up to fourth, while the #18 remained ninth, as two quick Full Course Yellow periods were deployed for the #2 K's Frontier KTM and the #60 Team G/Motion Toyota stopping on track for mechanical issues.
An hour later, the #18 Asano Racing Service moved up to seventh, the #120 made its way to the podium positions, while the #822 AndLegal Racing took the ST-5F lead, shortly before mechanical gremlins took them out of contention as they were forced to stop the car on the exit of Turn 5, bringing out the FCY.
Two more FCY periods then ensued in the following hour, due to separate accidents for the #104 GR Team Spirit Toyota and the #821 AndLegal Racing Honda Fit3, during which the #18 Asano Racing Service Toyota jumped to sixth.
The final hour of the race proved to be calm, as the #120 Club Mazda Spirit Racing ran as high as second during the final pit cycle before ending the race in fifth in class, while the #822 AndLegal Racing Honda returned to the track with just over an hour left and cruised home to a fifth-place finish. In ST-4 meanwhile, the #18 Asano Racing Service Toyota was hit by mechanical problems late into the race, forcing them to head back to the garage with 47 minutes left, before eventually crossing the line eighth in class.
For Sunday's enduro, Riona Tomishita was the only woman on the grid, from which she started sixth in ST-2 in her first race with teammates Kiyoshi Umegaki and Rin Arakawa.
Driving in the opening stint, Tomishita gained two places in the opening hour, before leaving the car to Umegaki for the second stint, in which the Full Course Yellow was deployed due to the #6 Shinryo Racing Team Mitsubishi catching fire at Turn 9.
Following that, Umegaki jumped in the car and passed the #13 Endless Sports Toyota to move up to third, before then moving up to the lead shortly before the final round of stops, in which the #225 KTMS Toyota moved down to second behind the #95 Spoon Sports Honda Civic as Arakawa took back the wheel.
Despite a quick Full Course Yellow for the #20 Team Impul Nissan and the leading #95 Spoon Sports Honda dealing with lapped traffic and later a mechanical issue, the #225 KTMS Toyota came up just short of the win, as they ended the season-opening race in second place.
