The second round of the 2026 AUTOBACS SUPER GT season took place at Fuji Speedway in Shizuoka Prefecture on May 3–4. The 3-hour endurance race has been a mainstay in the history of Japanese motorsport, for the most part taking place on May 4 during Golden Week, one of the country’s most important holiday periods. A total of 83,600 fans went on a pilgrimage to the iconic circuit at the foot of Mt. Fuji for this year’s edition.

With May 4, the holiday known as Greenery Day, falling on a Monday, this made for an unusual Sunday–Monday “race weekend”. Since the teams are eligible to nominate a third driver for the endurance rounds, Daiki Fujiwara was joining James Pull and his teammate Tayo Ida. Fujiwara made his SUPER GT debut at last year’s Fuji Golden Week round and has been the team’s C driver ever since. The trio finished the single Free Practice session on Sunday morning in 17th, providing a solid starting point for the weekend’s running. Fujiwara was tasked to run in Q1 later that afternoon, but barely missed out on getting out of his group in P11, resulting in P19 on the grid for Monday’s race.

Despite a heavy storm during the night hours, the race got underway at 14:00 local time in perfect sunny conditions, with air and track temperatures of 24°C and 43°C respectively. Similar to the season opener, Pull was responsible for the opening stint. Starting around the middle of the GT300 pack, Pull immediately found himself in intense on-track action. Despite having to make sure to not use up his tyres too much, Pull quickly gained ground, picking up multiple positions as the race progressed. By the one-hour mark, he positioned the #48 Kenko K’s Frontier WM NILZZ inside the top 10, before coming into the pits on lap 43, just a few moments before the race got neutralized with a full-course yellow for one of the GT500 cars stopping on track. Pitting under FCY is prohibited in SUPER GT, which meant the timing of the pit stop was even more crucial than usual.

Pull passed the steering wheel to C driver Fujiwara, who continued to pick up where Pull left off, making sure the team’s Nissan NISMO GT-R GT3 stayed in contention for a points finish. Following Fujiwara’s 45-lap stint, Ida climbed into the car for a short 17-lap stint to the finish. Even though the gentleman racer couldn’t quite go the same pace as Pull and Fujiwara, he made sure to secure the work of his teammates, bringing the car to the checkered flag in P15.

With this strong result, NILZZ Racing celebrated its first points finish since Round 3 at Motegi in 2016, when the team competed under the old Dijon Racing banner. With the GT300 class mainly dominated by Pro-Pro driver line-ups, Pro-Am line-ups are usually facing a high hurdle. But the strong teamwork of NILZZ Racing provided a prime example of what is possible. By finishing in the points, Pull already fulfilled the first goal he set for himself when he entered the series in only his second race, leaving his mark in the paddock.  
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James Pull:

“Finishing in the points in only my second race in SUPER GT and celebrating NILZZ Racing’s first points finish in 11 years felt phenomenal. Back then, Mitsunori Takaboshi was competing with the team, who later got the call by Nissan into its GT500 works staple, which is a high benchmark for me. When we pulled out of the garage on Sunday morning for Free Practice, we already felt that we had a package that would be good enough for the points. The battles on track were intense, but I managed to gain multiple positions throughout my stint. By perfectly connecting during our pit stops, we managed to run our strategy without any flaws. We don’t want to rest on our laurels, however. There may be a three-month break before the next race, but we now want to use this momentum to eventually fight for the podium.”