Team Yoshimura Suzuki riders Nobuatsu Aoki and Atsushi Watanabe will start tomorrow’s Suzuka 8-Hour World Endurance fifth round from sixth position following today’s WSB-style Superpole one-lap final qualifier. Reigning World Champions and current series leaders Suzuki Castrol missed the session after finishing outside the top 10 qualifiers yesterday and will start in 15th position.
World Endurance Champion, SERT Suzuki’s Keiichi Kitagawa, who is teamed with Matthieu Lagrive and Vincent Philippe, announced his retirement from the sport today.
He said: “I have decided to retire this season. I often think about my retirement because I turn 40 years old next year. It is very difficult to keep motivation for racing this year, so when I got the 2005 World Endurance Championship, I decided my retirement. This Suzuka 8 hours is my last race in Japan and I would like to enjoy this tough race!”
Nobuatsu Aoki:”We posted our GSX-R in sixth fastest but we did our job today. I’ve ridden the Yoshimura GSX-R for only two months but I feel very comfortable on this great Superbike! Atsushi and I made improvements in the engine and chassis set-up to GSX-R in very small steps day-by-day and we finally got a very good set-up for Suzuka. We want a good start and to run a very constant pace tomorrow and hope for a podium position.”
Final Practice Results:1: F.C.C. TSR ZIP-FM Racing Team: Takeshi TSUJIMURA/ Shin-ichi ITO (Honda) 2:08.515.
2: Sevenstar-HONDA 7: Ryuichi KIYONARI/ Makoto TAMADA (Honda) 2:08.560.
3: TOY STORY RT RUN'A & HARC-PRO: Yoshiteru KONISHI/ Takashi YASUDA (Honda) 2:08.616.
4: F.C.C. TSR ZIP-FM Racing Team: Yusuke TESHIMA/ Gaku KAMADA (Honda) 2:08.851.
5: YSP&PRESTO-racing: Katsuyuki NAKASUGA/ Shin-ichi NAKATOMI (Yamaha) 2:09.149.
6: Yoshimura-SUZUKI with JOMO: Nobuatsu AOKI/ Atsushi WATANABE (Suzuki GSX-R 1000) 2:09.195.
7: YAMAHA BLUE RACING: Colin EDWARDS/ Noriyuki HAGA (Yamaha) 2:09.252.
8: SEVENSTAR HONDA 11: Tadayki OKADA/ Osamu DEGUCHI (Honda) 2:09.487.
9: MASKED-RIDER KABUTO Honda DREAM RT: Tatsuya YAMAGUCHI/ Kazuki TOKUDOME (Honda) 2:10.137.
10: TEAM TYA-LLENGER: Norihiko FUJIWARA/ Nobuyuki OHSAKI (Yamaha) 2:11.163.
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