2009 Super GT Series

Originally the three makers agreed to unify engine specification to 3.4L V8 engines (the same configuration of Formula Nippon at the time). However, due to the aforementioned economic crisis, Nissan encountered difficulties to develop a suitable engine for their GT-R, and chose to bear a performance ballast while using the same engine as last year. Honda continued to use their mid-engine NSX with performance ballast as the regulations originally planned to mandate front-engine cars. This was also their last year in Super GT with the original NSX, as they announced they would use a new vehicle (the HSV-010) starting in the 2010 season. Honda returned with the NSX in 2014 following the unveiling of the second-generation concept car in 2014, later revised to be based on the production model in 2017; both of which ran midship engine layout until 2019 season.

Team Nova entered the series with a Le Mans spec Aston Martin DBR9. It was the first Aston Martin car to participate the series history (including JGTC), and also the first European and non-Honda/Nissan/Toyota car in GT500 since the 2006 season (a Maserati MC12 did participate the pre-season test in 2006 season but withdraw from the series later). The DBR9 only ran at the first round at Okayama and the two rounds at Fuji, and as of July 2020 is the last non-Japanese car to compete in GT500.

The apr Racing Team, which had used the Toyota MR-S for a long time decided to discontinue their use of MR-S, and for this season decided to replace it with a mid-engined Toyota Corolla Axio instead.

The Cusco, the only team using an AWD car (Subaru Impreza), left the series as they wanted to concentrate on off-road events. However, Subaru cars were not absent from the series as R&D Sport used a Legacy B4 for round 6, 7 and 9.

Thunder Asia Racing, a team from Singapore, entered round 4 at Sepang with a Mosler MT900R. Their full participation in 2010 season was confirmed after the 2009 season ended.

In order to combat sandbagging, where a team would intentionally perform poorly in order to secure a more favorable weight handicap, the success ballast formula was changed starting from this season: the ballast would be halved in the penultimate race and lifted altogether in final race for teams that participated in every round of the season. Teams missing only one round receive halved-ballast in the final race instead.

Scoring system

Rank Driver OKA SUZ FUJ SEP SUG SUZ FUJ AUT MOT PTS 1 Juichi Wakisaka André Lotterer 11 2 2 6 7 8 3 1 2 88 2 Ralph Firman Takuya Izawa 3 14 3 3 14 12 1 4 1 81 3 Satoshi Motoyama 13 11 1 8 1 6 2 2 14 78 4 Benoît Tréluyer 13 11 1 8 1 2 2 14 73 5 Toshihiro Kaneishi Koudai Tsukakoshi 5 6 12 2 6 10 4 Ret 3 51 6 Ryo Michigami Takashi Kogure 2 5 13 12 3 4 8 5 10 50 7 Ronnie Quintarelli Hironobu Yasuda 12 13 7 1 9 2 6 8 12 49 8 João Paulo de Oliveira Seiji Ara 1 8 4 5 13 11 13 3 11 48 9 Hiroaki Ishiura Kazuya Oshima 9 7 5 9 12 1 7 7 9 44 10 Yuji Tachikawa Richard Lyons 6 1 9 10 10 3 10 11 13 41 11 Tsugio Matsuda Sébastien Philippe 4 3 15 7 8 5 15 Ret 7 36 12 Daisuke Ito Björn Wirdheim 10 4 6 14 5 Ret 4 10 4 35 13 Yuji Ide 8 12 11 4 4 9 12 6 8 29 14 André Couto Kohei Hirate 15 10 10 13 2 7 11 12 5 27 15 Shinya Hosokawa 8 12 4 4 9 12 8 24 16 Loïc Duval Yuhki Nakayama 7 9 8 11 11 Ret 9 9 6 18 17 Kosuke Matsuura 11 6 5 18 Michael Krumm 6 5 19 Katsutomo Kaneishi 10 1 Akihiro Tsuzuki Takeshi Tsuchiya 14 14 14 0 Rank Driver OKA SUZ FUJ SEP SUG SUZ FUJ AUT MOT PTS

Colour Result Gold Winner Silver 2nd place Bronze 3rd place Green Points finish Blue Non-points finish Non-classified finish (NC) Purple Retired (Ret) Red Did not qualify (DNQ) Did not pre-qualify (DNPQ) Black Disqualified (DSQ) White Did not start (DNS) Withdrew (WD) Race cancelled (C) Blank Did not participate (DNP) Did not arrive (DNA) Excluded (EX)

Scoring system

Rank Driver OKA SUZ FUJ SEP SUG SUZ FUJ AUT MOT PTS 1 Manabu Orido Tatsuya Kataoka 1 8 5 2 5 6 4 3 3 85 2 Nobuteru Taniguchi Ryo Orime 3 2 3 3 11 7 DNS 2 2 82 3 Tetsuya Tanaka Katsuyuki Hiranaka 4 4 Ret 8 3 5 2 1 4 79 4 Takayuki Aoki Tomonobu Fujii 12 6 2 DNS 4 8 1 18 1 71 5 Morio Nitta Shinichi Takagi 2 5 1 10 9 2 7 4 14 71 6 Hiroki Katoh 6 7 9 1 2 3 5 16 16 63 7 Kazuki Hoshino Masataka Yanagida 7 3 6 4 6 1 9 8 7 62 8 Hiroki Yoshimoto 7 9 1 2 3 5 16 16 58 9 Mitsuhiro Kinoshita Masami Kageyama 1 1 6 45 10 Takuto Iguchi Yuji Kunimoto 5 9 8 16 8 4 12 7 5 32 11 Yuya Sakamoto 9 11 7 6 10 18 15 5 6 23 12 Koji Yamanishi Atsushi Yogo 18 Ret 18 5 13 17 3 11 8 20 13 Tsubasa Abe 10 10 4 7 16 14 9 9 18 14 Haruki Kurosawa 10 10 4 Ret 16 14 9 12 15 Kyosuke Mineo 10 18 15 5 6 12 16 Hideki Yamauchi 9 11 7 6 11 17 Kota Sasaki 8 17 11 7 15 9 13 13 10 10 18 Tetsuji Tamanaka Akazame Oyaji 13 12 10 12 16 Ret 8 6 15 9 19 Naoya Yamano 8 17 11 7 15 9 9 20 Kazuho Takahashi 6 5 21 Tsubasa Kurosawa 7 4 22 Yuhi Sekiguchi 9 13 13 10 3 23 Masayuki Ueda Masataka Kawaguchi DNS 16 15 9 20 15 17 19 13 2 24 Katsuhiko Tsutsui Ret 16 9 2 25 Hideshi Matsuda Yuya Sakamoto Ret 13 19 Ret 12 10 10 12 11 2 26 Shozo Tagahara Ret DNQ Ret Ret Ret Ret 10 Ret 1 27 Taku Bamba Ret 10 Ret 1 Rank Driver OKA SUZ FUJ SEP SUG SUZ FUJ AUT MOT PTS

Colour Result Gold Winner Silver 2nd place Bronze 3rd place Green Points finish Blue Non-points finish Non-classified finish (NC) Purple Retired (Ret) Red Did not qualify (DNQ) Did not pre-qualify (DNPQ) Black Disqualified (DSQ) White Did not start (DNS) Withdrew (WD) Race cancelled (C) Blank Did not participate (DNP) Did not arrive (DNA) Excluded (EX)