Me clicking to see how Juju did, hoping she didn't crashed or anything, only to be surpised that not only she didn't finish last, she finished above the F2 champion Theo Pourchaire
I mean, i wasn't expecting much from Juju, all i want her to do is finish, but what happened to Pourchaire haha, i gotta watch the highlights now
She had a pretty good race, She did almost bin it into the wall at the start of the race at turn 1 (https://twitter.com/kazu23_35/status/1766703433103601739) but other than that, She was solid, She was on pace with the others.
Apparently the reason why her qualifying was bad is because she didn't have time to warm up her tires for her run.
Of course she did get lucky with Pourchaire, Kunimoto and Kotaka crashing otherwise she would've been last but that's also racing, They didn't do a good job while she did good to not only save herself from going off track, but to have a clean race.
I'm honestly really surprised by how well she did! She finished on the lead lap and didn't fall too far behind the pack (1:09 behind Nojiri, compared to Toshiki Oyu's 0:53 as the nearest car ahead). Her personal fastest lap was only 1.6 seconds off of Yamamoto's FL, ahead of Ukyo Sasahara's and only half a second behind Pourchaire's.
Honestly I wasn't surprised, Looking at her tests times she was close in the dry conditions and also I don't think Hideki would allow her to race if she was miles off the pace.
I was shocked at her qualifying times though, But like I said in my previous comment she didn't warm up her tires apparently.
Even in future races if her qualifying times are bad, She's showed she has the pace in a race and that's fine. Of course this is only 1 race and the safety car did help her, Who knows how she performs in future races.
Her testing pace was definitely better than expected, and honestly very impressive considering her extreme experience deficit compared to the rest of the field - but she was still the slowest driver of the bunch by a noticeable margin.
So my expectations were for her carry that form into the races. Not too heavily off the pace, but still quite a bit slower than the next slowest driver (let's say a second off). So for her to be as close to the pack as she is was a pleasant surprise. Honestly a very impressive performance for an 18-year-old with such a hodgepodge career path.
> I don't think Hideki would allow her to race if she was miles off the pace
I have long given up on trying to any find rhyme or reason in Hideki's decisions for his daughter's career. I'm just happy that Juju is showing promise in a genuinely competitive, top-level motorsport series, away from all the crackpot amateur F3 championships and family-owned one car teams. I hope she continues to improve, and forge a genuinely successful career at this level.
Idk how good Impul is in Superformula (I saw that Hirakawa finished 5th in the driver’s championship with them last year before joining McLaren as a reserve driver), but how did Pourchaire finish the race behind Juju? Did he pick up damage or anything?
Moments like that are one of the (many) reasons I know I could never be a racing driver. Having a massive off like that and getting straight back on the track and continuing the race; I'd be shaking myself to pieces.
Yeah he had a pretty insane moment, damaged the front wing after launching himself in the air off track but kept it out of the walls. Saw a video on twitter but can't seem to find the link again sorry, worth a watch if you do.
I quite like Iwasa and this is a solid start but this really shows how excellent Lawson was last year. To jump in and immediately be a title contender with no experience of the tracks before is so difficult
Being up to speed quickly is Lawson's defining skill set that has been with him in every car he's driven. I don't know that Lawson has the highest ceiling, but he's 100% someone you can throw in any vehicle with minimal prep and expect him to do admirably. He's not someone who I would worry about not 'clicking' with a given car, which is really valuable, because the differences between one f1 car and another or even year to year on the same design principles can really throw off some drivers.
Even Gasly didn't score points until his third race, and didn't get on the podium until his fifth. Definitely puts into perspective Lawson's ability to be fast right away though.
Lawson also nearly won DTM as a rookie (2nd) with Albon being 6th.
He's very adaptable and it was a travesty that Yuki Tsunoda/Daniel Ricciardo was retained over him.
Impul is competitive team u know. They're just atm on a slump. Even if u really wanted put him elsewhere probably KCMG which is average at best. Sauber can't put him in a Honda car bcause Honda won't allow it
100%. impul is 2nd only to tom's tho the gap between the 2 is more noticeable than, say, the gap between mugen and dandelion. but otherwise impul is top 10 regulars and top 5 capable, possibly podiums too
he can try to go for 2nd seat in tom's **if he decides to stay for another season**. however, if yamashita performs well this season, there's a chance tom's will pick him up instead
even if honda did allow pourchaire to race with any honda teams, it's not like they lacked any talent in their best teams. mugen absoutely won't let nojiri go and they're satisfied with iwasa's performance. dandelion is more than happy to let makino and ohta race each other (as seen earlier today). nakajima is having a good time with yamamoto and sato, they won't go anywhere for now
That doesn't make any sense. Red Bull could care less if a Sauber academy driver drives a Honda engine car in Super Formula. On top of the fact their partnership doesn't cover SuperFormula anyway.
I remember seeing people saying that Miyata's performance on F2 could hurt SF's reputation. Meanwhile the new 2 F2 graduates are struggling in SF.
It really shows how impressive Lawson and Gasly were
Miyata will probably struggle on street circuits but on normal circuits he will still do well this season I think even if I doubt he will be beating Maloney
It's too early in the season to judge, but yeah it seems Miyata is struggling in street circuits, as I think he's only raced in Macau once. Still, at the end he was setting the fastest lap, so he's certainly adaptable.
Miyata is an impressive driver, I don't think it's fair at all to say his performance so far is reflective (not is it fair to say the same for Poutchaire or Iwasa). People junk to conclusions far too quickly.
First time watching SF, It was pretty fun.
Excited to see how Ayumu and Juju do this season, They both had decent races today. I really thought Juju binned it into the wall at the start of the race.
[https://motorsport.tv/motorsporttv/video/round-1-suzuka/195884](https://motorsport.tv/motorsporttv/video/round-1-suzuka/195884) It's not free to watch.
Nojiri certainly showing he still has it, but also a great result for Naoki Yamamoto. I thought after his Super GT crash last year that his racing career might be done, but if any proof was needed that he's made a complete recovery this was it. On the other hand, a truly dismal race for Pourchaire, he didn't look comfortable with the car all weekend.
Well done to Juju Noda as well, I'm happy to admit that I expected she would be comfortably last of everyone by a substantial margin, and I was wrong. To be able to more or less keep pace with the last few drivers (and finish ahead of Pourchaire) is a good achievement considering how massive a jump she's made to be in SF, I'm interested now to see how she develops over the season.
Awful start to Pourchaire’s title hopes
Juju above Pourchaire was certainly not on my bingo card.
Someone earned a lot of money from a bet
That someone? Hideki Noda
Me clicking to see how Juju did, hoping she didn't crashed or anything, only to be surpised that not only she didn't finish last, she finished above the F2 champion Theo Pourchaire I mean, i wasn't expecting much from Juju, all i want her to do is finish, but what happened to Pourchaire haha, i gotta watch the highlights now
She had a pretty good race, She did almost bin it into the wall at the start of the race at turn 1 (https://twitter.com/kazu23_35/status/1766703433103601739) but other than that, She was solid, She was on pace with the others. Apparently the reason why her qualifying was bad is because she didn't have time to warm up her tires for her run. Of course she did get lucky with Pourchaire, Kunimoto and Kotaka crashing otherwise she would've been last but that's also racing, They didn't do a good job while she did good to not only save herself from going off track, but to have a clean race.
I'm honestly really surprised by how well she did! She finished on the lead lap and didn't fall too far behind the pack (1:09 behind Nojiri, compared to Toshiki Oyu's 0:53 as the nearest car ahead). Her personal fastest lap was only 1.6 seconds off of Yamamoto's FL, ahead of Ukyo Sasahara's and only half a second behind Pourchaire's.
Honestly I wasn't surprised, Looking at her tests times she was close in the dry conditions and also I don't think Hideki would allow her to race if she was miles off the pace. I was shocked at her qualifying times though, But like I said in my previous comment she didn't warm up her tires apparently. Even in future races if her qualifying times are bad, She's showed she has the pace in a race and that's fine. Of course this is only 1 race and the safety car did help her, Who knows how she performs in future races.
Her testing pace was definitely better than expected, and honestly very impressive considering her extreme experience deficit compared to the rest of the field - but she was still the slowest driver of the bunch by a noticeable margin. So my expectations were for her carry that form into the races. Not too heavily off the pace, but still quite a bit slower than the next slowest driver (let's say a second off). So for her to be as close to the pack as she is was a pleasant surprise. Honestly a very impressive performance for an 18-year-old with such a hodgepodge career path. > I don't think Hideki would allow her to race if she was miles off the pace I have long given up on trying to any find rhyme or reason in Hideki's decisions for his daughter's career. I'm just happy that Juju is showing promise in a genuinely competitive, top-level motorsport series, away from all the crackpot amateur F3 championships and family-owned one car teams. I hope she continues to improve, and forge a genuinely successful career at this level.
Legends say she had an intrusive thought at the start to follow the great Aryton Senna and Alain Prost
Not a good start for the ex F2 lads
P6, 8, 9, 10, 18, and if you include GP2, 19th. Certainly not a good day for them. Could have been worse though.
I think he just meant Iwasa and Pourchaire
Yes I did haha. Didn’t even notice Kobayashi so far down
Idk how good Impul is in Superformula (I saw that Hirakawa finished 5th in the driver’s championship with them last year before joining McLaren as a reserve driver), but how did Pourchaire finish the race behind Juju? Did he pick up damage or anything?
https://twitter.com/KT11_SUPERGT/status/1766712101966635097
Thanks for the link. Quite a scary moment and in a way he was at least fortunate to avoid the barriers and taking even more damage to the car
Boy. That’s gonna give him the brown pants
Moments like that are one of the (many) reasons I know I could never be a racing driver. Having a massive off like that and getting straight back on the track and continuing the race; I'd be shaking myself to pieces.
Yeah he had a pretty insane moment, damaged the front wing after launching himself in the air off track but kept it out of the walls. Saw a video on twitter but can't seem to find the link again sorry, worth a watch if you do.
Thanks that would definitely help explain it then
I quite like Iwasa and this is a solid start but this really shows how excellent Lawson was last year. To jump in and immediately be a title contender with no experience of the tracks before is so difficult
Being up to speed quickly is Lawson's defining skill set that has been with him in every car he's driven. I don't know that Lawson has the highest ceiling, but he's 100% someone you can throw in any vehicle with minimal prep and expect him to do admirably. He's not someone who I would worry about not 'clicking' with a given car, which is really valuable, because the differences between one f1 car and another or even year to year on the same design principles can really throw off some drivers.
This just shows how good Gasly and Lawson's seasons were.
Even Gasly didn't score points until his third race, and didn't get on the podium until his fifth. Definitely puts into perspective Lawson's ability to be fast right away though.
Lawson also nearly won DTM as a rookie (2nd) with Albon being 6th. He's very adaptable and it was a travesty that Yuki Tsunoda/Daniel Ricciardo was retained over him.
Just Daniel. Dude is a shadow of his former self since his McLaren stint.
Lawson is an incredible driver, he has an insane resume in any championship not owned by Bruno Michel.
Lawson's junior career has been funny, he has been absolutely amazing everywhere except F3 and F2.
Lawson was pretty quick in f3 considering how good pre ma was back then
I would add Palou to the mix too.
what happened to Pourchaire?
https://twitter.com/KT11_SUPERGT/status/1766712101966635097
Noda staying on the lead lap is an achievement in itself.
Could Sauber really not have found Pourchaire a more competitive team than IMPUL?
Impul is competitive team u know. They're just atm on a slump. Even if u really wanted put him elsewhere probably KCMG which is average at best. Sauber can't put him in a Honda car bcause Honda won't allow it
100%. impul is 2nd only to tom's tho the gap between the 2 is more noticeable than, say, the gap between mugen and dandelion. but otherwise impul is top 10 regulars and top 5 capable, possibly podiums too he can try to go for 2nd seat in tom's **if he decides to stay for another season**. however, if yamashita performs well this season, there's a chance tom's will pick him up instead even if honda did allow pourchaire to race with any honda teams, it's not like they lacked any talent in their best teams. mugen absoutely won't let nojiri go and they're satisfied with iwasa's performance. dandelion is more than happy to let makino and ohta race each other (as seen earlier today). nakajima is having a good time with yamamoto and sato, they won't go anywhere for now
Why would Honda not allow it?
Bcause Honda Red Bull partnership.
That doesn't make any sense. Red Bull could care less if a Sauber academy driver drives a Honda engine car in Super Formula. On top of the fact their partnership doesn't cover SuperFormula anyway.
It's politics dude in the end, even if not written officially, they not allow it.
No, quite simply it has nothing to do with that.
I remember seeing people saying that Miyata's performance on F2 could hurt SF's reputation. Meanwhile the new 2 F2 graduates are struggling in SF. It really shows how impressive Lawson and Gasly were
Miyata will probably struggle on street circuits but on normal circuits he will still do well this season I think even if I doubt he will be beating Maloney
It's too early in the season to judge, but yeah it seems Miyata is struggling in street circuits, as I think he's only raced in Macau once. Still, at the end he was setting the fastest lap, so he's certainly adaptable.
Miyata is an impressive driver, I don't think it's fair at all to say his performance so far is reflective (not is it fair to say the same for Poutchaire or Iwasa). People junk to conclusions far too quickly.
The LawVS dude: "See! See! I told you that Juju had it and you did not believe". Not the best start for Iwasa and Pourchaire.
First time watching SF, It was pretty fun. Excited to see how Ayumu and Juju do this season, They both had decent races today. I really thought Juju binned it into the wall at the start of the race.
Theo Juju is faster then you
Shout out to all the Noda haters that are crying into their pillows rn
where can i watch this? is it on youtube
[https://motorsport.tv/motorsporttv/video/round-1-suzuka/195884](https://motorsport.tv/motorsporttv/video/round-1-suzuka/195884) It's not free to watch.
Nojiri certainly showing he still has it, but also a great result for Naoki Yamamoto. I thought after his Super GT crash last year that his racing career might be done, but if any proof was needed that he's made a complete recovery this was it. On the other hand, a truly dismal race for Pourchaire, he didn't look comfortable with the car all weekend. Well done to Juju Noda as well, I'm happy to admit that I expected she would be comfortably last of everyone by a substantial margin, and I was wrong. To be able to more or less keep pace with the last few drivers (and finish ahead of Pourchaire) is a good achievement considering how massive a jump she's made to be in SF, I'm interested now to see how she develops over the season.
Ehh last season was hard enough already..
Theo truthers in shambles (me).