FDJ2 2026 Rd.1 Fuji Results: Jayce Wins the Opener from 11th

Jayce (ジェイス, #23) won FDJ2 2026 Round 1 at Fuji International Speedway (Shizuoka) on Saturday 25 April 2026, beating Riki Nakamura (中村龍輝, #1) in the final; Eita Uehara (上原詠太, #831) was classified third and Manato Mogi (茂木真那斗, #270) fourth. The 18-year-old started the season with 103 points and a 19-point championship lead, having qualified only 11th and then beaten four FDJ3 graduates in a row. This report was written up on 7 September 2026 from the official result sheet and report, and the sheet is still headed 暫定リザルト（修正版）, a revised provisional list; every number here was checked on the official pages on 7 Sep 2026.

Who won FDJ2 Round 1, and how?

FDJ2 is the development tier of the Formula Drift Japan ladder, between the top class and the grassroots FDJ3; how the three tiers fit together is in our Formula Drift Japan guide. Round 1 opened a six-round season and ran inside FUJI XTREME DAYS, the 24 to 26 April festival at which the top class took its own Fuji round the day after FDJ2 finished. It ran on the main racing circuit, not the Fuji Speedway Drift Park, the separate pad on the same site that only opened to individual drivers in June 2026. The judged section went from the exit of Coca-Cola corner to the hairpin exit, with outer zones at 100R, before the hairpin and on its exit, and an inner clip at the hairpin itself.

Friday 24 April was tansō (単走), solo judged runs, two each, and it cut 38 cars to 16 — half the usual bracket, because FDJ2 takes only 16 qualifiers at the three rounds it shares with the top class. Uehara, eleventh out in the running order and making his first FDJ2 start, opened with 90: thirty each for line, angle and style, style being the maximum. Kei Maeda (前田慶, #86) answered with 83, Shoei Tokuyama (徳山昇英, #151) 79, Mogi 87 and Nakamura 85, all of them promoted from FDJ3 and all teenagers. Run two took Uehara to 94, two more apiece on line and angle with the perfect style score held, and that was the solo win, from Mogi on 87, Tokuyama on 85 and 79, Nakamura on 85 and 71 and Ryusuke Aoki (青木竜介, #109) on 84. Jayce scored nothing in run one and 79 in run two, enough for eleventh and three qualifying points.

Saturday 25 April was tsuisō (追走), the tandem chase battles. Jayce’s route went through Maeda, Tokuyama, Mogi and then Nakamura: 3 qualifying points plus 100 for the win, 103 for the round. Nakamura beat HINATO (#620), Fan Pei (裴凡, #117) and Uehara for 84. Every driver in the Final 4 was a teenager, three of them up from FDJ3. Uehara and Nakamura went to a One More Time, and the rerun went to Nakamura on three judges’ calls, the decider being a wheel-off on Uehara’s first run. In the other half Mogi’s car failed while he was leading; he took the five-minute competition timeout, repaired it and came back to chase well, but Jayce’s lead run was clean and the place went to him. Then the final: Nakamura led, his engine let go, and run two never started. He climbed out of the stopped car and waved to the grandstand in tears.

The bracket: which battles are worth rewatching?

Four of the eight Top 16 battles went to the lower qualifier, which is a lot for an opening round. Kazuyuki Tomite (冨手和行, #210), down from the top class for 2026, went through from ninth against Kiminobu Deguchi (出口公信, #193). Fan Pei, at his first FDJ2 event, cancelled his opening qualifying run, took 77 in the second for twelfth, and then put out fifth-placed Aoki. Tomoyuki Kitashiba (北芝倫之, #48) needed a One More Time to see off Shuichi Shinouchi (篠内秀一, #95). And Jayce, from eleventh, beat Maeda.

Uehara’s own first battle never happened: Tomosuke Sano (佐野友介, #106), sixteenth and last in, retired with engine trouble, so the top qualifier advanced unopposed. The Great 8 then followed the seeding everywhere but the last pairing, where Jayce put Tokuyama out and left the third-fastest qualifier fifth.

Who led the FDJ2 championship after Round 1?

Round 1 was the opener, so the championship table after it is the round’s own point ranking, transcribed from the official FDJ2 ranking sheet and cross-checked against the Round 1 columns on the 2026 FDJ2 standings page on 7 September 2026.

On a shared weekend the scale runs 100 battle points for the win, 80 for second, 64 for each losing semi-finalist, 48 for the Great 8 losers and 32 for the Top 16 losers, with a single point for anyone who missed the cut. Qualifying paid 7 for P1, 6 for P2, 5 for P3, then 4 down to eighth and 3 down to sixteenth, so 107 was the most the weekend could give anyone. Twenty non-qualifiers left with their single point. Nineteen points covered the top two, and Jayce’s lead lasted exactly one round.

Where the season went next

Nakamura won FDJ2 Rd.2 at Suzuka Twin Circuit on 24 May, beating Jayce in a rerun of this final and taking the championship lead by three points. He won Rd.3 at Ebisu Circuit West Course on 21 June from Mogi to stretch it to 53, and at Rd.4 at Sportsland SUGO on 11 July Tokuyama took his first FDJ2 win with Nakamura second, which pushed the lead out to 103.

The next round you can still get to is FDJ2 Rd.5 at Okuibuki Motorpark (Shiga) on Saturday 12 and Sunday 13 September 2026. Admission is ¥3,500 a day, car parking ¥1,500 and motorcycle parking ¥1,000, all sold at the gate only with no advance sale, and each day needs its own ticket. The finale is FDJ2 Rd.6 at Okayama International Circuit on Friday 2 and Saturday 3 October 2026, where an advance ticket is ¥3,800 and a same-day one ¥5,000.

Getting up the valley is what catches people out at Okuibuki. The ¥1,500 station shuttle from JR Maibara is a ski-season product, and the resort’s own access page still names a bus that Maibara City abolished on 1 October 2020. What runs today from Ōmi-Nagaoka Station is a weekday nine-passenger Maichan Bus at ¥800, last one back from the valley at 13:55, and a shared taxi at the same fare that has to be booked by phone in Japanese at least an hour ahead for this area. Both stop at Kōzuhara, roughly 3 km short of the car parks, and the pickup that covers the rest is another Japanese phone call. Every leg, with timetables and numbers, is in our Okuibuki Motor Park guide.

Every remaining 2026 date, FDJ2, FDJ and D1 alike, sits on the event calendar, rechecked each month.