Practice report
Super Formula Fuji
Fuji Super Formula: Palou leads Newey in practice
Nakajima Racing’s Alex Palou topped the timesheets in first practice for Super Formula’s Fuji round, leading fellow ex-European F3 driver Harrison Newey.
Rachit Thukral
Edited: Jul 12, 2019, 1:25 PM
Copy link
Share on Viber
It was TOM’S driver Kazuki Nakajima who monopolised the top spot for much of the one-hour session, leading with an early benchmark of 1m23.893s.
He improved marginally to a 1m23.866s after bolting on a set of soft tyres - and that time remained unbeaten until a flurry of late laps in the final 15 minutes of the session.
Reigning Japanese F3 champion Sho Tsuboi was the first driver to depose Nakajima from the top with a time of 1m23.687s.
But with five minutes to go, Palou managed to go even quicker, lapping the ex-Formula 1 venue in 1m23.287s.
That time would ultimately never be toppled, although B-Max by Motopark driver Newey ended up within three tenths to end up second.
Nakajima made a late improvement of his own to finish third ahead of Kondo Racing’s in-form man Kenta Yamashita and the aforementioned Tsuboi, who slipped to fifth in the final order.
Red Bull junior Lucas Auer, who secured his maiden Super Formula at Sugo last month, was classified sixth, half a second down on pacesetter Palou.
Auer was set to go even quicker after setting a personal best in sector one, before aborting the lap and heading straight into the pits to end his session.
Team LeMans’ Kazuya Oshima, fresh off a Super GT win at Buriram, was next up in seventh, with Ryo Hirakawa eighth for Impul.
Tadasuke Makino finished ninth in the second of the Nakajima Racing cars, while Kondo’s Yuji Kunimoto completed the top 10.
Championship front-runners Nick Cassidy and Naoki Yamamoto languished in 13th and 14th respectively, the two separated by just 0.001s.
Red Bull junior Patricio O’Ward completed 27 laps on his Super Formula debut, his best effort of 1m25.535s placing him 20th in the timesheets.
O'Ward trailed Mugen teammate Tomoki Nojiri - who was 15th - by seven tenths.
Practice results:
Cla Driver Team Time Gap 1 Alex Palou
TCS Nakajima Racing 1'23.287 2 Harrison Newey
B-MAX with Motopark 1'23.569 0.282 3 Kazuki Nakajima
Vantelin Team TOM'S 1'23.611 0.324 4 Kenta Yamashita
Kondo Racing 1'23.678 0.391 5 Sho Tsuboi
JMS P.mu/cerumo-INGING 1'23.687 0.400 6 Lucas Auer
B-MAX with Motopark 1'23.766 0.479 7 Kazuya Oshima
UOMO Sunoco Team LeMans 1'23.892 0.605 8 Ryo Hirakawa
Team Impul 1'23.966 0.679 9 Tadasuke Makino
TCS Nakajima Racing 1'24.237 0.950 10 Yuji Kunimoto
Kondo Racing 1'24.392 1.105 11 Nirei Fukuzumi
DoCoMo Team Dandelion Racing 1'24.514 1.227 12 Artem Markelov
UOMO Sunoco Team LeMans 1'24.710 1.423 13 Nick Cassidy
Vantelin Team TOM'S 1'24.841 1.554 14 Naoki Yamamoto
DoCoMo Team Dandelion Racing 1'24.842 1.555 15 Tomoki Nojiri
Team Mugen 1'24.869 1.582 16 Kamui Kobayashi
carrozzeria Team KCMG 1'24.890 1.603 17 Koudai Tsukakoshi
Real Racing 1'24.942 1.655 18 Hiroaki Ishiura
JMS P.mu/cerumo-INGING 1'25.195 1.908 19 Yuhi Sekiguchi
Team Impul 1'25.357 2.070 20 Patricio O'Ward
Team Mugen 1'25.535 2.248 View full results
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?
Take our 5 minute survey.
- The Motorsport.com Team
Read and post comments
Read also :
Share Or Save This Story
Copy link
Share on Viber
Previous article Can O'Ward succeed where Ticktum failed?
Next article O'Ward "slowly getting the hang" of Super Formula
Top Comments
There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?
View More & Comment
More from
Rachit Thukral
Jorge Martin the slowest Aprilia in Australia practice: “I'm used to riding with the Ducati here”
MotoGP
MotoGP
Australian GP
52 min
Jorge Martin the slowest Aprilia in Australia practice: “I'm used to riding with the Ducati here”
Ducati says Aprilia “can do whatever they want” amid team order talks in MotoGP
MotoGP
MotoGP
Australian GP
1 h
Ducati says Aprilia “can do whatever they want” amid team order talks in MotoGP
Latest news
Belgian firm to take over Renault/Alpine engine facility in Viry
WEC
WEC WEC 12 min
Belgian firm to take over Renault/Alpine engine facility in Viry
Jorge Martin the slowest Aprilia in Australia practice: “I'm used to riding with the Ducati here”
MotoGP
MGP MotoGP
Australian GP
52 min
Jorge Martin the slowest Aprilia in Australia practice: “I'm used to riding with the Ducati here”
2027 Winter Series calendar: Three series across five circuits
General
Misc General 1 h
2027 Winter Series calendar: Three series across five circuits
Ducati says Aprilia “can do whatever they want” amid team order talks in MotoGP
MotoGP
MGP MotoGP
Australian GP
1 h
Ducati says Aprilia “can do whatever they want” amid team order talks in MotoGP
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
You have 2 options:
- Become a subscriber.
- Disable your adblocker.
Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here
Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page
Manage Alerts
Subscribe