Chris van der Drift will make his second appearance of the season in the Lamborghini Auckland Huracán Super Trofeo EVO2 as Lamborghini Super Trofeo Asia returns for the fourth round of 2024 at Fuji in Japan.
The Absolute Racing-run car has won five of this season’s six races, with the first three coming at the hands of Marco Giltrap and Clay Osborne, who swept the opening round at Sepang and took one win at The Bend.
Van Der Drift took control of the car as the sole driver in the last round at Inje Speedium in South Korea and comfortably won both races, winning by eight seconds in Race 1 before powering to a margin of over 20 seconds in Race 2.
He returns as a solo driver at Fuji.
Twenty-three Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeo EVO2s across four classes are confirmed for this weekend’s round, with 15 teams campaigning 39 drivers.
In the absence of Giltrap and Osborne in the last round, SJM Iron Lynx Theodore Racing’s Charles Leong Hon Chio and Miki Koyama took the overall PRO class lead. The team has finished on the podium in every race but has yet to secure a win.
DW Evans GT’s Dan Wells and Emilien Carde are only three points behind as the only other race winners this year. They triumphed in the opener at The Bend, where Giltrap and Osborne failed to finish.
While Giltrap and Osborne have slipped to fourth in the standings, one place ahead of van der Drift, the Kiwis’ successes have given Absolute Racing a 16-point advantage in the Team’s Championship.
Super GT Japan GT300 stars Shunsuke Kohno and Yuya Motojima are also appearing this weekend, joining Promotion Racing.
Two 15-minute qualifying sessions begin official proceedings on Saturday morning before the first 50-minute race at 4.35 pm NZST that afternoon.
Teams return on Sunday for a second race, which goes green at 4.20 pm.
Both races will be live-streamed via the Lamborghini Squadra Corse YouTube channel.
Header Image: Van der Drift and Giltrap in action at The Bend in 2023. Image: Lamborghini Squara Corse