In the qualifying for the 18th round Ishiura secured his first pole since round seven at Okayama ahead of Streit, who regained his form after readjusting the car setup during an interval. With little opportunity of clear racing line Oshima settled for fifth on the grid behind Jarvis and Tsukakoshi. It was cloudy and the road surface temperature was quite chilly at 22 degrees C when the race started at 3:13 pm to cap the Sendai weekend with 3 races. All the cars made their starts as the red signals went off.

　Ishiura made a good start to lead into the first corner. Clutch trouble delayed Streit’s start, allowing Jarvis and Tsukakoshi to move past him. Although the Brazilian got his spot back from Tsukakoshi to third as he went into third corner he fell slightly short of keeping up with the TOM’S duo of Ishiura and Jarvis, who both showed impressive pace already on the opening lap.

　The other TOM’S racer Oshima, however, could not get back to the start/finish line. Due to a clutch-slip he lost driving force just after the start, limply going back to pit. Despite his plan to score podium finish from fifth on the grid to ensure an advantage for title battle at Motegi, Oshima was forced to retire and recorded no point from this race.

　Jarvis closely chased Ishiura in the early stages, but the pole-sitter gradually pulled away from his team-mate setting the fastest lap on lap four and enjoying as much as 6s lead for a while. “We had a meeting where we discussed the difficulty I had in Race two with the car setup and reviewed the data, and the team perfectly set the machine. I was confident of my win the moment I made a good start,” said Ishiura. He led all the way in the 24-lap race to take second win of the season from pole. Jarvis took second. Tsukakoshi continued to put pressure on Streit, but failed to get the better of him finishing fourth, with Sekiguchi and Yasuda fifth and sixth quickest respectively.

　Oshima went into the Sendai weekend at the top in the standings, but scored no point again. The title battle will therefore be fought between Streit, Jarvis and Oshima in the final race weekend at Motegi.

● Round16/17/18「Sendai」Result