After suffering technical issues on its race debut in a wet Okayama race, the #31 apr-run Lexus shared by Koki Saga, Kazuto Kotaka and third driver Yuki Nemoto enjoyed a much smoother run at Fuji, finishing eighth from second on the grid.
Pre-season, apr boss Hiroto Kaneso cited Suzuka and Sugo as the tracks where he expects his new creation to be at its strongest, owing to its high levels of downforce.
However, the pace at Okayama proved better than expected - the #31 machine qualified sixth and rain inside the points until an emergency stop was made to fix the windscreen wiper - and the positive trend continued in qualifying at Fuji.
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After rookie Nemoto cleared Q1, Kotaka caused a surprise when he came up just 0.062 seconds shy of poleman Joao Paulo de Oliveira in the Kondo Racing Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 to grab second on the grid.
While Kotaka admitted his frustration at missing out on the pole, he said the way the LC500h was able to combine its prowess through high-speed corners with some of the strongest speed trap figures of any car in the GT300 shows how strong the car can be.
“Because the drag is low, the straight line speed is good, but I can also feel the downforce,” Kotaka told Motorsport.com’s Japanese edition. “At Fuji, from A-corner [Turn 3] all the way through 100R, because there is good downforce you feel like you can attack.
“Compared to the 86, the roofline is low and driver changes are a bit more difficult, but for that reason the drag is low. That, combined with strong downforce, is this car’s real strength.
“I think we can still set the car up with better weight distribution, so there is still room for improvement. But the fact I was able to get this far so soon shows how good apr is.”
Come race day, starting driver Saga started to slip back through the field early on before pitting after only 10 laps for a full service pitstop - in contrast to the other GTA-GT300 cars that had come in early on to refuel only.
This was because Bridgestone tyres were too soft, but Nemoto and then Kotaka showed much stronger pace to recover to finish inside the points in eighth place.
“The tyres were already finished after two laps,” Saga admitted speaking to Motorsport.com’s Japanese edition. “If we could have done three stints on hard tyres, I think we could have finished between P4 and P6, so I don’t think the performance is bad.”
Next up for the Lexus LC500h is Suzuka, the track that Kaneso has had his eye on from the day the car was revealed to the world back in January.
But Saga says the new machine’s relatively strong showing in the first two races of the season shows that nothing can be taken for granted.
“The fact it’s suitable for Suzuka is just our imagination, and we won’t know until we actually drive there,” he said. “After all, Okayama, which we thought would be a bad track, turned out to be surprisingly good.
“But at the very least, compared to when we were using the Prius, we can definitely fight for higher positions, so that’s a good thing.”
