Yamaha calls on YART for Suzuka 8 Hours campaign

Having skipped the 2022 Suzuka 8 Hours with its factory team, Yamaha will again rely on the YART World Endurance team for its 2023 8 Hours effort.

Yamaha's official plans for the 2023 Suzuka 8 Hours have been announced, with the brand's factory Endurance World Championship team once again being Yamaha's official representation at the race.

Yamaha Austria Racing Team (YART) will be Yamaha's official presence at the Suzuka 8 Hours for the second year in a row, after they took over the role at last year's race, when it finished seventh having crashed from a podium position.

The rider line-up will remain unchanged for 2023, with Niccolo Canepa, Karel Hanika and Marvin Fritz set to compete. There will also be technical and operational support from Yamaha Motor for YART at Suzuka.

Mandy Kainz, Team Manager Yamalube YART Yamaha EWC Official Team, said: "Since our first appearance at the Suzuka 8 Hours in 2004, I have been obsessed with standing on the podium. After a few 4th places, we were so close last year, until we crashed in the last hour lying on P3 and ended up only 7th. For 2023 we will fight even more focused and harder and hopefully make it."

Previous to YART taking over the factory Suzuka representation for Yamaha in 2022, the Yamaha Factory Racing Team (YFRT) won every edition of the 8-hour race from 2015-2018, before Kawasaki dethroned the #21 bike in 2019.

Last year, Honda won the race convincingly - their first win since 2014 - despite opposition in the form of a full-factory effort from Kawasaki and the Provec Racing team that runs their factory WorldSBK programme.

Recently, it was announced that Kawasaki will not field a factory team in the 2023 Suzuka 8 Hours. Yamaha's announcement that the YART team will continue to be its only official presence in Suzuka (therefore that there will be no return of YFRT), and the reality that Suzuki's representation will come from the Yoshimura SERT team that is a regular competitor - like YART - in the Endurance World Championship, means that HRC is likely to be the only full factory team at the 2023 Suzuka 8 Hours.

The 2023 Suzuka 8 Hours is scheduled for 4-6 August 2023.