K-tunes Racing is a racing team based in

Kurashiki is a city located in Okayama Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 478,651 and a population density of 1300 persons per km2. The total area of the city is . Geography Kurashiki is located in the south-central part of Okay ...

Okayama Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region of Honshu. Okayama Prefecture has a population of 1,826,059 (1 February 2025) and has a geographic area of 7,114 Square kilometre, km2 (2,746 sq mi). Okayama Prefecture ...

, Japan, run by Okayama Toyopet.

History

Toyota is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturer headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi, Japan. It was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda and incorporated on August 28, 1937. Toyota is the List of manuf ...

car dealership Okayama Toyopet founded K-tunes Racing in 2013. The team was named after the Kurashiki GR Garage, taking the "K" with the word "tunes" to indicate

car tuning Car tuning is the modification of a car to optimise it for a different set of performance requirements from those it was originally designed to meet. Most commonly this is higher engine performance and dynamic handling characteristics but cars ...

. In 2018, the team competed in the GT300 class of

Super GT Super GT (stylized as SUPER GT) is a sports car racing series that began in 1993. Launched as the , generally referred to as the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship (JGTC), the series was renamed to Super GT in 2005. It is the top level of ...

with a Lexus RC F GT3. The car number was 96, the drivers were Morio Nitta and Toyota factory driver Yuichi Nakayama, and they used

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tires. They had a collaboration with

LM Corsa LM corsa is a racing team based in Osaka Prefecture and the team is run by Osaka Toyopet Group's OTG Motor Sports. History OTG Motor Sports Osaka Toyopet, is a company who runs Toyota car dealer in Osaka founded OTG Motor Sports. The team runs S ...

to operate the team, competing in a joint system with three teams, with Inging Motorsport in charge of vehicle maintenance. They won two races, and Nitta gained the record for the most wins in a row, which had been previously held by

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. For 2019, they recruited

Sena Sakaguchi is a Japanese racing driver for Toyota Gazoo Racing who is currently competing in Super GT for Racing Project Bandoh and in Super Formula for Cerumo・INGING Motorsport, INGING. He is the champion of the 2020 Formula Regional Japanese Champions ...

as Nitta's co-driver, and changed the team management to a system where the team is operated solely by the company, while Inging continued to be in charge of vehicle maintenance. They won the opening race in

Okayama is the prefectural capital, capital Cities of Japan, city of Okayama Prefecture in the Chūgoku region of Japan. The Okayama metropolitan area, centered around the city, has the largest urban employment zone in the Chugoku region of western J ...

and the third race in Suzuka, and finished the season in second place in the driver/team rankings, their best result since the team's founding. In 2020, the team changed its tire manufacturer to Dunlop and became independent by carrying out in-house vehicle maintenance. After a strong performance the previous year, the team finished the season winless with only two points finishes. In 2021, Sakaguchi competed in the GT500 class as a replacement for

Sacha Fenestraz Sacha Fenestraz Jules (born 28 July 1999) is a French Argentines, French-Argentine racing driver competing in the 2025 Super Formula Championship, driving for TOM'S, TOM'S Racing. He is the 2017 Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 champion. Early caree ...

for a couple of rounds, with

Hibiki Taira is a Japanese racing driver who most recently competed in Super GT for Hyper Water Racing Inging and in Super Formula for TGMGP. He is the champion of the 2020 F4 Japanese Championship, as well as a two-time class winner in the Super Taiky� ...

replacing Sakaguchi for those rounds.

replaced Sakaguchi, who was promoted to the GT500 class. Nitta and Takagi were reunited for the first time in 12 years, having been teammates at ARTA until 2010. K-tunes Racing also made their debut in

GT World Challenge Asia The GT World Challenge Asia (formerly Blancpain GT Series Asia and Blancpain GT World Challenge Asia) is a Grand tourer, GT series motor racing competition promoted by the Stéphane Ratel Organisation and organized by Team Asia One GT Management. ...

in 2022, with Nitta and Masanori Nogami in the Lexus RC F GT3 for the fifth round. They returned for the Japan Cup in 2023 with Kazunori Suenaga replacing Nogami. They also entered a GT4

Toyota Supra is a sports car and grand tourer manufactured and developed by the Toyota Motor Corporation beginning in 1978. The name " supra" is a definition from the Latin prefix, meaning "above", "to surpass" or "go beyond". The initial four generations ...

with Hiromitsu Fujii and Masanori Nogami. In 2024, the team expanded their entry with an additional car, the Ferrari 296 GT3 driven by Takagi and Daisuke Yamawaki.

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://www.oktp.jp/ktunesracing Japanese auto racing teams Super GT teams Auto racing teams established in 2013 Toyota in motorsport