Fuji Super Formula: Kunimoto scores maiden pole

Team TOM’S driver Kazuki Nakajima had the early benchmark with a 1m23.265s before a flurry of late laps shuffled the former F1 driver down the pack.

Kunimoto was one of the last to cross the flag, lapping the Fuji International Speedway in 1m23.044s to secure his first pole position of the season.

2015 champion Hiroaki Ishiura locked the front row for Inging, just 0.063s shy of his teammate.

Team Impul’s Yuhi Sekiguchi was another tenth behind in third, while Nakajima eventually dropped to fourth by the time the chequered flag fell.

Naoki Yamamoto was once again the top Honda driver in fifth, albeit half a second slower than Kunimoto’s chart-topping time.

Kondo Racing duo Kenta Yamashita and Nick Cassidy qualified sixth and seventh respectively, the latter sharing the fourth row with Red Bull junior Pierre Gasly.

Earlier in Q2, Le Mans 24 Hours pole record holder Kamui Kobayashi spun on track, bringing out a red flag.

The intervention proved particularly costly for championship leader Andre Lotterer, who was left with little tyre grip towards the end of the session to progress into Q3.

Lotterer will start Sunday’s race from 12th, two positions ahead of Kobayashi.

Qualifying results:

Pos.	Driver	Team / Engine	Time	Gap
1	Yuji Kunimoto	Inging/Toyota	1'23.044	-
2	Hiroaki Ishiura	Inging/Toyota	1'23.107	0.063
3	Yuhi Sekiguchi	Impul/Toyota	1'23.193	0.149
4	Kazuki Nakajima	TOM'S/Toyota	1'23.265	0.221
5	Naoki Yamamoto	Mugen/Honda	1'23.478	0.434
6	Kenta Yamashita	Kondo/Toyota	1'23.516	0.472
7	Nick Cassidy	Kondo/Toyota	1'23.785	0.741
8	Pierre Gasly	Mugen/Honda	1'23.902	0.858
9	Jann Mardenborough	Impul/Toyota	1'24.081	1.037
10	Felix Rosenqvist	LeMans/Toyota	1'24.093	1.049
11	Tomoki Nojiri	Dandelion/Honda	1'24.173	1.129
12	Andre Lotterer	TOM'S/Toyota	1'24.202	1.158
13	Takuya Izawa	Dandelion/Honda	1'24.308	1.264
14	Kamui Kobayashi	KCMG/Toyota	1'27.969	4.925
15	Daisuke Nakajima	Nakajima/Honda	1'24.612	1.568
16	Narain Karthikeyan	Nakajima/Honda	1'24.781	1.737
17	Koudai Tsukakoshi	Real Racing/Honda	1'24.802	1.758
18	Takashi Kogure	B-Max/Honda	1'24.821	1.777
19	Kazuya Oshima	LeMans/Toyota	1'24.855	1.811