FDJ3 2026 Rd.4 Okuibuki Results: Peres Wins, Notsu Loses the Lead

Ricky Peres (リッキー ぺレス, #70) won FDJ3 2026 Round 4 at Okuibuki Motorpark in Maibara, Shiga, on Sunday 20 September 2026, beating Minato Oike (大池水杜, #371) in the final; Gommert David (ゴマート デイビッド, #81) was classified third and PANDA KUN (#3) fourth. The day’s real damage was done in the morning: championship leader Souta Notsu (野津颯太, #80) qualified 19th and missed a Top 16 cut that fell at 74 points, leaving with 1 point. The official standings table had not absorbed the round when we read it, but adding the provisional Round 4 points to it puts Ryu Funabashi (船橋竜, #64) on 212 and Peres on 211, one point apart with two rounds left. Every figure below was read off the official formulad.jp pages on 20 Sep 2026, and the result sheet is headed 暫定リザルト, provisional.

Who won Round 4, and how?

FDJ3 is the entry tier of Formula Drift Japan and runs one-day rounds. This one, badged YOKOHAMA Presents, ran at Okuibuki Motorpark, the drift course laid out on the car parks of the Gransnow Okuibuki ski resort above Maibara; our Okuibuki Motor Park guide covers the venue and the awkward last few kilometres to reach it. Admission was ¥3,000 and car parking ¥1,500, sold at the gate on the day only, with qualifying from 09:30 to 12:20 and the Top 16 to the final from 13:50 to 16:30.

The morning was tansō (単走), solo judged runs, two per driver, ranked on the better score. Forty-six cars are on the entry list and 43 carry a finishing position on the result sheet. Gommert David, an American running a JZX110 Verossa for Sappy Racing, topped it with an 86 and a 69 backup; Otgonbaatar Zoljargal (オトゴンバートル ゾルジャラガル, #98) of Mongolia was second on 83, PANDA KUN third on 83 with a weaker second run, Funabashi’s Z33 Fairlady Z fourth on a matched pair of 81s, and Peres fifth on 81. The cut fell at 74 with three drivers tied on it, and only Issa Minakawa (皆川一茶, #135) went through, on a 73 backup against 68 and 65. Notsu was two points short of that fight at 73, 19th.

The afternoon was tsuisō (追走), the tandem chase battles, two runs per pairing with lead and chase swapped. Peres, a Brazilian in a JZX100 Chaser, went through Akira Ogiyama (荻山章, #91), then Funabashi in the Top 8, then top qualifier Gommert David in the semi-final. Oike came out of the other half past Zoljargal, Rion Irifune (入舩梨桜, #39) and PANDA KUN. The official sheet lists outcomes rather than the judges’ scores, so we will not invent them: Peres won the final, and 3 qualifying points plus 100 for the win gave him 103, his second win of 2026 after Round 1 at Fuji. The sheet gives both semi-final losers 60 battle points and separates them on qualifying, so Gommert David’s 6 for topping the morning put him third on 66 and PANDA KUN fourth on 64.

The bracket: which battles are worth rewatching?

Two results ran hard against the qualifying order. Oike went into the day 15th of 16, the second-lowest seed in the bracket, and reached the final by beating the second, tenth and third qualifiers in turn. Yutaka Momose (百瀬豊, #917), ninth, knocked out eighth-qualifier Atsushi Tarumi (樽見淳, #222) and reached the Top 8 with a season total of 1 point behind him. The Top 8 tie between Peres and Funabashi is the one to rewatch, because it is also the championship: the two of them are now one point apart.

Who leads the FDJ3 championship after Round 4?

The official standings page on formulad.jp still showed only Rounds 1 to 3 when we read it on 20 September 2026, hours after the podium, so there is no official post-Okuibuki table to transcribe yet. The left column below is that official table. The right column is our own arithmetic, the official through-Rd.3 totals plus the points on the official provisional Round 4 sheet, and it is not the organiser’s word.

Notsu had led since Round 2 and arrived 15 points clear. On this arithmetic he leaves fourth, 25 behind, because a missed cut is worth 1 point while a Top 8 finish is worth 43. SEIKA was listed as 欠場, absent, on the entry list and scored nothing. The scale, read off the result sheet, is 100 battle points for the win, 80 for the runner-up, 60 for each semi-final loser, 40 for a Top 8 exit and 20 for a Top 16 exit, plus 6 for qualifying P1 down to 1 for missing the cut, so each of the two remaining rounds is worth up to 106. Four rounds have now produced three winners, Peres twice. How FDJ3 sits under FDJ2 and the top class is in our Formula Drift Japan guide.

One thing the table does not show is what the drivers are actually racing for. Formula Drift Japan’s own notices for this round framed the second half of the season as a fight for the championship and for promotion rights to FDJ2, which is why a Top 8 result in the middle of the order still matters here.

Where can you watch the replay?

▶ 2026 FDJ3 Round 4 TOP16 to FINAL FORMULA DRIFT JAPAN · official channel click to load from youtube

The morning’s qualifying went up as a separate video on the same channel a few hours earlier.

Next round: dates, tickets and getting there

Round 5 is at Fuji Speedway Drift Park in Oyama, Shizuoka, on Sunday 18 October 2026, and the finale is at Tsukuruma Circuit Nasu in Tochigi on Sunday 1 November. Both are one-day Sunday rounds. As of 20 September the Rd.5 event page listed ticket, programme, entry list and timetable as Soon, with no price published, which is normal at this distance: Okuibuki’s admission notice landed 26 days out and the timetable 11 days out. Driving in it is not an option for a visitor, because FDJ3 sells a season entry rather than single rounds and 2026 applications closed in February.

Fuji is the easiest round of the six to reach. The drift pad sits inside the Fuji Speedway complex under Mt Fuji, about two hours from central Tokyo, and our Fuji Speedway Drift Park guide has the approach and what the pad is actually like. The part that catches people out is the same one that catches them out at Okuibuki: the last leg. Fuji Speedway is a shuttle or taxi ride from Gotemba station, the shuttle runs to the major race weekends rather than to every event, and an FDJ3 round is not a major race weekend. On a Sunday morning that difference decides whether you see qualifying at all.

Every FDJ3, FDJ2 and Formula Drift Japan date left in 2026 sits on the event calendar, rechecked against formulad.jp each month.