{"id":352976,"date":"2025-12-17T02:25:19","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T02:25:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/352976\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T02:25:19","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T02:25:19","slug":"japans-only-aussie-v8-ute-racer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/352976\/","title":{"rendered":"Japan&#8217;s only Aussie V8 Ute racer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>THE V8 Ute Series remains a popular part of Aussie motorsport history, though it wasn\u2019t often that overseas drivers competed in the unique Holden versus Ford category.<\/p>\n<p>However, there was that one time a Japanese driver entered the fray \u2013 and ended up with a very damaged Commodore as a result!<\/p>\n<p>Ryo Orime made a one-off appearance in the final round of the 2010 series at Sydney Olympic Park on the Homebush street circuit at the wheel of a Samboy Chips-backed Commodore Ute.<\/p>\n<p>A Ute owned by Scott Jennings \u2013 who these days manages Team 18 Supercars racer <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-1264-Anton-De Pasquale\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Anton De Pasquale<\/a> \u2013 Orime\u2019s Holden was run by Hi-Tech Motorsport for the weekend.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/superstore.v8sleuth.com.au\/products\/v8-sleuth-magazine-subscription-issues-1-6?utm_source=SRBuyButton&amp;utm_medium=website\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/sleuth-mag-subscription-1-6_1024x1024.jpg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The-then 28-year-old was based in Singapore at the time and reportedly had raced Formula Nippon and Super GT300 sportscars in Asia.<\/p>\n<p>Backing for the event came from the then-new SG Changi circuit and Orime had his first taste of the Ute at the Norwell Motorplex in Queensland.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Ute is very interesting to drive, it\u2019s totally different from a GT,\u201d he said at the time in <a href=\"https:\/\/issuu.com\/v8sleuth\/docs\/20101130_enews_183\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Motorsport eNews Issue 183, available here online.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is no downforce and no grip. The feeling of braking is very different. I had less than one day to learn to drive the car but I\u2019ve picked it up very quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, Orime\u2019s one-off weekend in a V8 Ute ended quickly.<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/News_OrimeSyd2010DK-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-244067\"  \/>The left overs of the smashed Commodore. Photo: an1images.com \/ Dirk Klynsmith.<\/p>\n<p>The debutante qualified an impressive ninth, but his first, and only, race didn\u2019t even last a single lap.<\/p>\n<p>He miscalculated at the left-handed Turn 8 on the opening lap of Race 1 on Saturday and was sucked into the outside wall, almost instantly smashed into from behind by Gary MacDonald\u2019s Ice Break Coffee Commodore.<\/p>\n<p>That set off a chain reaction of cars ploughing into the accident zone, a range of them damaged in the incident.<\/p>\n<p>The damage to the rear of the Orime Commodore was huge and he was sidelined for the remainder of the weekend, leaving his one-off V8 Ute drive over without completing a single racing lap.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/issuu.com\/v8sleuth\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Visit the full Motorsport News and Motorsport eNews archive here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"THE V8 Ute Series remains a popular part of Aussie motorsport history, though it wasn\u2019t often that overseas&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":352977,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-352976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=352976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/352977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}