The Super Formula competition in Sugo was marked by an unexpected outcome when Nirei Fukuzumi took the victory after an incident with the safety car, leaving Igor Fraga visibly frustrated by the situation.
Everything was decided at the end of the 27th lap of the race, when the safety car was activated due to two incidents involving Sena Sakaguchi and Roman Stanek. Fraga, who was leading the race with his Nakajima Racing car, opted to pit for his stop at a time when the other leading drivers had already completed their mandatory stops.
After his pit stop, Fraga managed to exit just ahead of drivers Tomoki Nojiri and Kakunoshin Ohta. The restart was reactive, but while most drivers followed Fraga into the pits, Fukuzumi decided to stay out and did not manage to stop until the end of lap 28, which allowed him to gain a considerable advantage.
At the resumption of the lap 36, the situation remained stable among the top three, and Fukuzumi managed to maintain the lead with a margin of just 0.505 seconds ahead of Iwasa and 0.939 seconds ahead of Fraga. This victory, his second of the season, represents a significant advancement in the championship for Fukuzumi.
In his post-race statements, Fraga could not contain his frustration over the circumstances that had deprived him of victory, arguing that the result should not be considered valid due to the way in which the race had unfolded.
At the back of the grid, Ohta overtook Nojiri to secure fourth place, thus maintaining his lead in the standings with 45.5 points with four races to go. Nojiri secured fifth place, while the points classification was completed by TOM’S drivers Sho Tsuboi and Sacha Fenestraz, as well as Zak O’Sullivan and Ren Sato.
On a day also marked by the performance of Luke Browning, who managed to climb up to 10 positions, he ended without points by less than three-tenths of a second after suffering incidents during the practice session.
Written by FormulaRapidaAI
