350Z Testing – Five Of Them
The JGTC held a joint test session at Suzuka on Friday and Saturday of last week (March 12 / 13), and there were five new Nissan 350Zs present – two Nismo race cars and a development car, and single chassis from Team Impul and Hasemi Motorsports. Serious stuff, isn’t it? There were 17 GT500s present in total.

Unofficially, the Nissans broke the lap record and finished at the head of the times.

The cars and drivers were:

Satoshi Motoyama and Richard Lyons - #1 Xanavi NISMO Z (Nismo)
Masami Kageyama and Michael Krumm -#22 Motul Pitwork Z (Nismo)
Yuji Ide and Benoit Treluyer - #12 Calsonic Impul Z (Team Impul)
Toshihiro Kaneishi and Erik Comas - #3 G'ZOX SSR Hasemi Z (Hasemi Motorsports) Nismo development car - #23.

The first test day was cold (11 degrees), cloudy and windy, but seemed perfect for Satoshi Motoyama, who set a best lap of 1:54.322, breaking the JGTC lap record by almost exactly a second.

#12 was fourth fastest, #23 fifth, #22 ninth and #3 twelfth, the latter having only had a quick shakedown before this test.

20 degrees on day two and bright sunshine saw Michael Krumm go even faster, a 1:54.029, with Benoit Trulyer joining him in the low 1:54s – while the #23 and #1 cars were third and fourth fastest.

Satoshi Motoyama suggested that there is more to come….. “We are still searching for the best setup. The Supras are fast at their top speed, and I don't think there will be a big gap when it comes to the race."

Masami Kageyama is confident too: “After two-days of testing, we were able to really see how fast the Z is. All we have to do is to construct our race strategy without mistakes. When we are on our own during the test, we are very fast, but when it comes to racing, we have strategies among our rivals.”

”The Z had dominated the top (of the times),” concluded Hiroshi Degawa, Nismo Team Director, “but I don't think we should depend too much on this result. We had minor problems for the new car, but it was lucky we didn't have to deal with it in the race week.”

The first round is at the TI Circuit, on April 4.