GT3 / 16 October 2023
NSX GT3 Evo 22 sets fastest lap at gruelling Petit Le Mans
The NSX GT3 Evo 22 ended the IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship by setting the fastest lap at a gruelling Petit Le Mans on a weekend when customer teams were in action on three continents.
IMSA
It was Kyle Marcelli – the GTD pole-sitter for March’s Sebring 12 Hours for the Racers Edge with WTR Andretti team – who set the fastest lap of the season-closing Petit Le Mans.
He did so as part of a fightback for the team, who were forced to park their NSX behind the wall just 20 minutes into the 10-hour race and lost more than 15 laps while replacing a variety of components.
Marcelli, Ashton Harrison and Danny Formal ran flawlessly for the remainder of the race and finished 14th in class.
Gradient Racing were another to stage a gallant recovery drive after Katherine Legge – who qualified sixth – was given a drive-through penalty for changing lanes before the starting lights had been switched off.
Despite the car falling to the back of the pack after the penalty, Legge, Sheena Monk and Marc Miller climbed to eighth place when a gearbox issue put them out with 90 minutes to go.
GT World Challenge Europe
It was a tough season finale for JAS Development Driver Leonardo Moncini and co-driver Jacopo Guidetti, a graduate of the programme, at a weather-affected Sprint round at Zandvoort.
After qualifying fourth in the Silver Cup, Guidetti was pushed off the track and onto slippery damp grass at the start of Race One by another car; he and Moncini recovering to fourth in class for Nova Race by the end of the 60-minute race.
They ended Sunday’s encounter fifth to seal fifth place in the standings in their maiden season of racing outside Italy.
Team-mates Erwin Zanotti and Alex Frassineti were eliminated on the first racing lap on Sunday; Frassineti an innocent victim in a chain reaction triggered by an incident further up the field. The pair were seventh on Saturday.
Super GT
Both Honda teams suffered unlucky races in the latest round of the season at Autopolis. Having qualified ninth in GT300, Syun Koide was punted into the gravel at one-quarter distance by another car while running inside the top 10.
Over a lap was lost as his car was recovered and he and co-driver Takashi Kobayashi were restricted to 18th place.
Yogibo Racing driver Reimei Ito had climbed into the top 10 when he lost a front wheel, leading to an emergency pitstop.
Co-driver Yugo Iwasawa climbed aboard at the same time but retired just a few hundred metres after exiting the pits.
All the mentioned cars were competing as part of the NSX GT3 Customer Racing Programme; a global collaborative project with JAS Motorsport responsible for assembly of all cars.
Honda Performance Development (HPD) and M-TEC handle sales and technical support in North America and Japan respectively, with JAS responsible for these areas across the rest of the world.
