> ARN Porsche and Team Studie BMW out front
> Result: FP2
Japanese drivers topped both classes in second practice at Suzuka this afternoon thanks to ARN’s Yuta Kamimura and BMW Team Studie’s Takayuki Kinoshita.
Another dry and bright 45-minute session saw the day’s earlier benchmark lowered by three tenths when Kamimura banged in a trio of fastest times during the opening 17 minutes. The last of them – 2m01.885s – was 0.6s faster than anyone else could manage.
The #8 Porsche’s advantage was trimmed late on when Rio Haryanto jumped up to second following a 10-minute stoppage to recover Team iRace.Win’s Mercedes-AMG and Absolute Racing’s Audi, which had tangled at the final corner. The T2 Motorsports Ferrari finished a tenth clear of HubAuto Corsa’s similar 488 shared by Yuya Sakamoto and Andre Heimgartner, and another 0.3s ahead of JRM’s Porsche.
The first of Absolute Racing’s 911s was next up, Sathienthirakul/Hamprecht’s example beating Melvin Moh’s Craft-Bamboo Mercedes-AMG, while Naoki Yokomizo (Anstone Racing) and Leo Ye Hongli (Absolute Racing) completed the top-eight.
GT4 ended in the same fashion as the opening session thanks to Team Studie, although this time it was Kinoshita who set fastest time. The BMW M4 he shares with Sunako Jukuchou traded top spot with Team iRace.Win’s Setiawan Santoso before finally stealing bragging rights on the final flying lap.
Santoso’s Mercedes-AMG thus finished 0.9s adrift, while Bryan Lee and Tony Fong claimed third for GTO Racing with TTR.
Saturday’s official practice session begins at 08:00 JST (+9 GMT) ahead of qualifying and the weekend’s first 60-minute race.