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Nakayama Misses out on 6th Consecutive Win Katsuta Wins Season-Opener
Takaboshi Wins from Pole in the F3-N class

   It was another warm and sunny day for qualifying at Suzuka. Due to the revised regulation for more powerful engines the practice session marked 1:51.335, which was unofficial but more than one second faster than the record time of the track.
    Although worsening road surface and red flag interruption affected the competitors four broke the record time, with Yuichi Nakayama of PETRONAS TEAM TOM'S setting 1:52.032 to win the pole, followed by his team mate Takamoto Katsuta, Shota Kiyohara of HFDP RACING and Katsumasa Chiyo of B-MAX ENGINEERING. Mitsunori Takaboshi of NDDP RACING topped the F3-N class and placed 6th overall, followed by Hiroshi Koizumi of HANASHIMA RACING and Nanin Indra-Payoong of TOM'S SPIRIT.
    With air temperature of 17 degrees C and road surface temperature of 33 degrees Katsuta made a great start from second at 3:30pm to overtake Nakayama who got off to a slow start as the two team-mates entered the first corner. Nobuharu Matsushita from 5th put his car in the 3rd position at the corner exit with solid leads over Kiyohara and Chiyo.
    Takaboshi's tardy start allowed not only Koizumi but also Indra-Payoong to pass him, but comfortably got ahead of Indra-Payoong by the end of the opening lap and Koizumi in turn 1 on lap 2.
    In an effort to overtake his team mate Nakayama went off the track and wasted about 1 second in the spoon curve on lap 3. Matsushita approached him rapidly but fell short in putting him pressure. In the meantime, Katsuta enjoyed 2.7 secs lead for a while.
    On shaking off the HFDP driver Nakayama started closing in on the preceding car, whereas Matsushita had difficulty with tyre management and eventually allowed Kiyohara to get ahead of him at turn 1 on lap 10. In his effort to regain the lead Nakayama beached the car over curb at chicane on lap 11 when he narrowed the gap to 1 second, allowing Katsuta to hold on to his lead to get his first win in the Japanese F3 championship.
    Nakayama wasn’t able to stretch his winning streak earned in 2012 to 6, settling for 2nd. Kiyohara scored the podium finish in his first appearance in the championship. Next came Matsushita, Chiyo and Tomoki Nojiri of TODA RACING, who started from the tail of the grid and gained 6th by the end of the opening lap.
    Takaboshi won the F3-N class in his debut and finished 7th overall. Indra-Payoong, who passed Koizumi on lap 3, finished 2nd in the class in his debut. Being handed a drive-through penalty for jumping the gun and passed by Dragon Koizumi ended up retiring when he span off on lap 9. Dragon also won the podium finish in his debut in the series by slowing down to save his tyres damaged in the qualifying.
    Motoyoshi Yoshida of B-MAX ENGINEERING did not start due to a mechanical failure. Shohei Yuzawa of TEAM NOVA WITH NIPPON IMM also retired after going off the course in the S-shape turn on lap 3 in battling for the 3rd in the class.

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