April 1 2017　Round. 1 Okayama

Takaboshi wins the season-opener in fair weather
F3-N: DRAGON fends off Shimono

Mitsunori Takaboshi（B-MAX NDDP F3）

After a rain on Friday it was cloudy early on the Saturday morning but soft sunshine was gradually beginning to stream over Okayama International Circuit when qualifying for the 2017 Japanese F3 season opening race started at 9:15 am.

● Palou takes pole position in drying conditions

Start of Japanese F3 Round 1

Despite most of the track still being slightly damp all the drivers came out on slick tyres except Masayuki Ueda (in Rn-Sports Yamashita Seisakusho). Early on only Sena Sakaguchi (HFDP RACING F316) and Yoshiaki Katayama (OIRC F315) managed under 1m 34 sec, but once Hongli Ye (KRC with B-Max F315) broke the 1m 31 sec barrier at 9:22 am the times began to be bettered in quick succession in the rapidly drying conditions.
The qualifying was so critical in that each driver’s best and second-best times in this 30-minute session would determine their grid for the first and the second race respectively out of the three races in the 2017 first race weekend that each squad was closely monitoring the developments to see when to switch to fresh rubbers. Top time changed from about 1m30 to 1m 26, and then 1m25, and as the session drew to an end it improved at an even faster pace.

Sho Tsuboi

However, Alex Palou was the only driver to post under 1m23. The rookie placed his ThreeBond on the pole position for both Rd 1 and Rd 2 races as he posted 1m22.965 two minutes before the chequered flag, and then 1m22.974 on his next lap.
Ritomo Miyata (Corolla Chukyo Kuo TOM’S F314) placed second ahead of Mitsunori Takaboshi (B-MAX NDDP F3), Sho Tsuboi (Corolla Chukyo Kuo TOM’S F317) and home favourite Yoshiaki Katayama (OIRC F315).
Shigetomo Shimono (CMS AVANTECH F306) also secured pole positions of F3-N for both Rd 1 and R2 races on his Japanese F3 debut, with Ryoya Hasegawa (Alb Niigata Daiichi Hotel Suger) in 2nd and DRAGON (B-Max Racing F306) in 3rd.

● Takaboshi gets a good start in the first race under clear sky

It began to clear up after the qualifying, and the formation lap started for 25 laps at 1:25 pm under a pleasant spring sky. Palou showed a good response from pole, only to almost stall, allowing Takaboshi to coast past from third place on the outside into turn 1 with Tsuboi behind.

Mitsunori Takaboshi

Although Palou held onto third place till Attwood another front-row starter Miyata caught up with him on the run to Revolver and overtook, demoting him to 4th place behind the Corolla Chukyos.
With the four leaders circulating at similar pace ranging from the latter half of 1m22 to 1m23 sec level within about a second of each other, Hiroki Otsu (TODA FIGHTEX) was lonely fifth, leaving Sakaguchi, Katayama and Ye closely battling.
The field saw some F3-N cars running a lap down just past the halfway point. Takaboshi successfully avoided the traffic to slightly extend his advantage over Tsuboi, who would instead find himself being closed to within 0.4 seconds to 0.6 seconds by Miyata and Palou.

DRAGON

Through the final few laps Takaboshi further opened up his lead. The 3-way battle over second position went into the last lap, ending up with Tsuboi defending the spot from his team-mate. Takaboshi comfortably clinched a victory, enjoying a 4.609 sec lead at the line, his successive win at Okayama after Rd 14 in 2016 displaying his great advantage at the track.
Palou took an honorable fourth place on his debut in the Japanese F3 championship behind Miyata. Sakaguchi battled it out to secure sixth place behind Otsu after a head-to-head fight with Katayama.
Despite a best start in the F3-N class Shimono slipped down the order to fifth place, moving DRAGON up to the lead over Katsuaki Kubota (Planex SmaCame F308) and Ueda. However, the CMS driver would play stunning catch-ups, snatching back the grounds one by one and reducing a large gap to the front-runner to finally come within about a second on the penultimate lap, and 0.7 sec on the final lap.
The scrap was eventually won by DRAGON, who crossed the line just 0.502 sec clear of Shimono. Ueda placed third.

Result & Entry List PDF