Category | Gran Turismo |
---|---|
Country |
Japan Thailand |
Inaugural season | 1993 |
Teams | 15 (GT500) 25 (GT300) (total: 40) |
Drivers' champion | GT500: Heikki Kovalainen Kohei Hirate GT300: Takeshi Tsuchiya Takamitsu Matsui |
Teams' champion | GT500: Lexus Team SARD GT300: VivaC team Tsuchiya |
Makes' champion | GT500: Lexus GT300: Toyota |
Official website | Super GT.net |
Current season |
Super GT is a grand touring car racing series that began in 1993. Originally titled as the Zen Nihon GT Senshuken (全日本GT選手権?), generally referred to as either the JGTC or the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship, the series was renamed to Super GT in 2005. It is the top level of sports car racing in Japan.
The series is sanctioned by the Japan Automobile Federation (JAF) and sponsored by the GT Association (GTA). Autobacs has served as the title sponsor of the series since 1998.
The JGTC (Japanese Grand Touring Championship) — established in 1993 by the Japan Automobile Federation (JAF) via its subsidiary company the GT-A (GT Association) — replaced the defunct All Japan Sports Prototype Championship for Group C cars (that was terminated by the end of 1994) and in the same year Japanese Touring Car Championship for Group A touring cars, which would adopt the supertouring formula which was used worldwide. Seeking to prevent the spiralling budgets and one-team/make domination of both series, JGTC imposed strict limits on power, and heavy weight penalties on race winners in an openly stated objective to keep on-track action close with an emphasis on keeping the race goers happy.
In its first ever race, which was also an IMSA GT exhibition race, apart from the GTS and GTU cars from the United States series, as with the rest of the season, the grid consisted of mostly Japan Super Sport Sedan cars with the only genuine JGTC cars being two Nissan Skyline GT-Rs entered by NISMO, which were in fact modified Group A cars. The prototypes and European GT cars would only appear one race to be joined by the IMSA and Group N cars at the Suzuka 1000 km.