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Nakayama Avenges His Defeat in Rd 1
Takaboshi Wins Two Straight Victories in F3-N class

Suzuka Circuit attracted many visitors to its stands for the season opener. The front row of the grid for Round 2 was dominated by PETRONAS TEAM TOM’S, with Yuichi Nakayama as the pole-sitter for the second time in a row, and Takamoto Katsuta sitting next. Behind the leaders came Nobuharu Matsushita of HFDP RACING and Katsumasa Chiyo of B-MAX ENGINEERING in the second row, and  Shota Kiyohara of HFDP RACING. Mitsunori Takaboshi of NDDP RACING took the 6th position, which was the highest in the F3-N class, followed by Hiroshi Koizumi of HANASHIMA RACING and Nanin Indra-Payoong of TOM’S SPIRIT.
When the grid was filled with 12 cars the air temperature was 17 degree C as it was in the previous round and the road temperature was 26 degree C, which was a bit lower. The second round was expected to be tougher for both the drivers and the tyres with 5 more laps to go.
Both the Petronas Team TOM’S drivers engaged clutch at almost the same time as the red signal went off at 10:23am. Taking advantage of his place Nakayama exited the first turn still out in front, not allowing his team mate to pass him again. The 3rd placed Matsushita made a late start locking up the way of Kiyohara right behind him, while Chiyo whizzed past the traffic jam. Despite having been caught by Koizumi on the straight due to his not good start, Takaboshi managed to hold his place into turn 1.
Nakayama completed the opening lap at the front of the field, with Katsuta 6 seconds behind, followed by Chiyo, Kiyohara, Matsushita and Tomoki Nojiri of TODA RACING, who started from the tail of the grid due to a mechanical failure during qualifying. A little further back was Takaboshi, followed by Koizumi, Indra-Payoong, and Motoyoshi Yoshida of B-MAX ENGINEERING and Dragon side-by-side with Shohei Yuzawa of TEAM NOVA WITH NIPPON IMM between them. On going into lap 2 Yuzawa made a move to get ahead of Yoshida in turn 1, and the B-Max driver also ceded his place to Dragon on lap 6 having difficulties keeping pace.
The battle for 2nd place in F3-N class was also seen in an early stage when Indra-Payoong overtook Koizumi in turn 1 from outside as he got out of slip stream generated on the straight on lap 3, but all he could do was hold on to the obtained place because Takaboshi was opening up his lead to more than 3 seconds.
In the meanwhile the pacesetter Nakayama, after setting the fastest lap of 1:53.226 on lap 2, was gradually pulling away from his team mate. Among the top 3 running alone for a while, Chiyo made a move in the closing stages. Whittling the gap with Katsuta to 1 second with 3 laps to go the B-Max driver waited for the chance to overtake, but the winner of the Rd 1 proved himself to retain the 2nd place.
Nakayama dominated the race from start to finish to claim his first victory of the season with 4-second lead over the runner-up. Chiyo picked up his first podium finish of the season. Kiyohara, Matsushita and Nojiri finished in the qualifying order.
In F3-N class Takaboshi got back-to-back wins and earned the highest possible points over this race weekend by setting the fastest lap. Indra-Payoong also placed 2nd in a row. Koizumi got his first podium finish of the season. Yuzawa finished for the first time of his career and placed 4th, followed by Dragon. On the ending lap smoke went out of Yoshida’s car. He was considered to have finished the race although he did not get the chequered flag.

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