Under a bright sun at the Fuji Speedway circuit in Japan, the cars have taken to the track for their first sessions of the 2015/16 Asian Le Mans Series.

In the first Free Practice session this morning, former F1 driver Shinji Nakano set the fastest lap of the day (1:36.667) in the #8 Race Performance Oreca 03R-Judd, competing in LM P2, outpacing the rest of the field by a good 4 seconds. They also went fastest in FP2.

In LM P3, DC Racing, are looking strong, with last year’s champions David Cheng and Ho-Pin Tung performing well in their new Ligier JSP3, setting the 3rd overall best time in both sessions; the quickest lap set in the car was 1:40.309 in the 2nd free practice session.

It was also great to see the arrival of Team AAI’s two ADESS 03 cars that managed to set some decent times at this, their international debut.

In GT, one of the cars to watch this weekend looks to be the Clearwater Racing McLaren 650S GT3, which was the fastest GT in both FP1 and FP2, 2nd fastest overall. Also looking strong are the #91 and #92 Team AAI BMW Z4 GT3s, who were among the quickest GT cars in both sessions. The #27 Nexus Infinity Ferrari 458 GT3 also looks like a contender, going 3rd fastest in GT in FP2, with their time of 1:41.536.

The #99 Eurasia Motorsport Oreca 03R Nissan, the 2nd LM P2 entry, couldn’t run today because of a technical issue. They are however sure that they will be ready for qualifying tomorrow.

Join us tomorrow for qualifying (11:00hrs) and the two-hour race (15:00hrs) here in Fuji!