+ Super GT500 driver roster for Summer Endurance Race
Nissan will battle for overall honours at the Suzuka 1000km next month thanks to Team 5ZIGEN’s Pro entry.
The GT World Challenge Asia powered by AWS race-winning squad has assembled a factory supported Super GT500 driver line up for the 50th Summer Endurance Race, which Nissan last won outright in 2012.
Atsushi Miyake, who races 5ZIGEN’s GT-R NISMO GT3 in SRO’s Asian series alongside his Super GT commitments with Kondo – is joined by GT500 rivals Katsumasa Chiyo and Kazuki Hiramine.
The latter was Super GT champion with Team Impul in 2022 and continues to compete with the works outfit in the Japanese series’ senior class. He also drives the GT3 version of the same car in Super Taikyu.
But to an international audience, at least, it’s Chiyo – who currently pilots NISMO’s coveted #23 Super GT entry – who is the best known of 5ZIGEN’s Suzuka trio. That’s predominantly thanks to his exploits with Nissan outside of Japan, and most notably at the Bathurst 12 Hour where he won as a relative unknown in 2015.
It would prove a breakout year for the now 39-year-old who also clinched the Blancpain Endurance Series title in Europe and finished as GT300 runner-up by claiming class victory at the Suzuka 1000km.
Chiyo was also an IGTC regular with KCMG in 2019 when Nissan officially contested SRO’s globe-trotting GT3 series. That isn’t the case at Suzuka where the GT-R and its drivers are solely competing for overall honours on September 11-13.
The GT-R might be more than 10 years old but 5ZIGEN – pronounced Go-Jeegun – continues to fight at the sharp end in both Asia and Super GT300. What’s more, the team and Miyake have extensive experience of the Pirelli tyres that will be used at Suzuka.