This year marked the 12th annual 24-hour Tokachi Super Taikyu endurance race. This race is highly regarded because it is the only 24-hour race in all of Japan. Tokachi Speedway is located on the island of Hokkaido in the northern part of Japan. Hokkaido is usually cool and comfortable, but at this year's event the temperature at the time of the start reached a sizzling 92 F, adding to the already difficult task of driving in a 24-hour enduro. The uncharacteristically warm temps caused everyone to ask, "Is this place really Hokkaido?" (They ought to add a "Welcome to Hokkaido" sign to clear up such confusion - JN).
For this fourth round of the Super Taikyu series there is no qualifying and a fixed starting grid is applied according to the point ranking for each class. Because of the prestige of the 24 hours of Tokachi many famous drivers who don't normally compete in the Super Taikyu series joined this race (a maximum of four drivers can be registered for each machine). Some of the big names included, but were not limited to, Super GT superstars Dominik Schwager, Marco Apicella, Yuji Ide, Masataka Yanagida, Toshihiro Kaneishi, Shogo Mitsuyama, and even ex-F1 ace Ukyo Katayama.
The long, hard race started at 3 pm. From the start in the ST1 class the No. 25 Advan Denag GT3 Porsche and the No. 1 Falken Porsche began to battle. But after the first hour the Advan Porsche lost 10 seconds from an incident where contact was made with a slower machine and the Advan car also received a 10-second stop-and-go penalty for a pitwork violation. This gave the Falken Porsche the first position. To make matters worse for the Advan Porsche, the right rear wheel hub was distorted from the earlier contact. So this machine had to pit to replace the parts. The Falken Porsche also had mechanical trouble (broken shift linkage) and had to pit for repairs.
In the ST2 class, the Ohlins Lancer Evo IX (the car has been on sale in Japan since March) leapt out to an early lead. But the two Impreza machines get better fuel mileage than the Lancer which translates to a great advantage in an endurance race like Tokachi.
There were many different machines in the ST3 class, such as the RX-7, Fairlady Z, BMW M3, NSX, and S2000. In this class the No. 23 C-West ORC Z has proven to be the most reliable machine. In the first three rounds of the '05 series alone this machine has won at Suzuka and Mine and taken second at Sendai. At Tokachi there were no major mechanical problems and the No. 23 car easily held the top position from start to finish. The ORC Z's teammate, the No. 48 Fields T&G Z, finished in the second position. C-West boss man and driver of the No. 23 Z Naofumi Omoto said, "Today is the best day of my racing career because we got the overall third position. I've been longing to stand on the podium. My dream comes true."
The dominance continued in the ST4 class where the No. 18 Cosmosonic21FK Integra remained in the top position for the entire race except for an unexpected pit stop to replace a flat-spotted tire.
The beautiful sunset lead the race into the night session. Even though the heat eased up in the evening fatigue started to attack the drivers. Eight hours from the start, the ST1 No. 3 Endless Advan Z jumped out to the overall lead where it remained for nearly four hours. But the Advan Z didn't get to enjoy the sunrise of the following morning as it crashed before dawn. In ST2 the Ohlins Lancer developed hub trouble and had to pit in, costing it 10 minutes and the lead. The No. 2 Fujitsubo HPI and No. 63 Wing Permagard Imprezas built up a one-two formation that they carried to the checkered flag.