After final racing earlier than COVID-19, Present Aikawa‘s FLEX SHOW AIKAWA Racing will make their return to the Asia Cross Nation Rally in August. The workforce will discipline a Toyota Land Cruiser 150 Prado for himself and Masato Kawabata with Daychapong Toicharoen as co-driver.
Kawabata and Toicharoen at the moment compete in D1 Grand Prix, the previous a three-time champion with titles in 2007, 2013, and 2015. Toicharoen hails from Thailand, the place the AXCR takes place, however is fluent in Japanese. In 2023, Kawabata completed ninth within the top-level D1GP standings whereas Toicharoen raced a part-time schedule.
In 2019, Kawabata completed second general in his AXCR début. AIKAWA Racing first appeared on the rally the yr prior, ending sixteenth with Aikawa, Kinya Miyamoto, and Takahiro Yasui.
Though they didn’t return to the AXCR after the onset of the pandemic, Aikawa stored the programme alive by competing within the XCR Dash Cup and Rally Hokkaido, each of which Kawabata gained in 2023. Aikawa himself additionally runs rallies in a Toyota Yaris from Toyota Gazoo Racing. Resulting from timing, the workforce will be unable to defend their Rally Hokkaido win, although Aikawa plans to discipline a second automobile sooner or later.
“It’s our first Asia Cross Nation Rally in 5 years, so each Kawabata and I are very excited and looking out ahead to it,” stated Aikawa. “We imagine that we are going to make up for the humiliation of 2019 and win our class.”
College students from Chuo Vehicle School in Chiba Prefecture in addition to mechanics from workforce title sponsor FLEX will present technical service for the Land Cruiser. Toyo Tires returns as a workforce associate whereas TONOX is helping in decreasing the automobile’s weight.
Aikawa starred in quite a lot of movies, notably from the motion, horror, and yakuza genres, in the course of the Nineteen Nineties and 2000s. He portrayed the titular hero within the Zebraman collection and starred in most horror motion pictures directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa like Pulse, Serpent’s Path, and the Go well with Your self or Shoot Your self TV movie collection. His newest movie Voice premiered in February.
The 2024 Asia Cross Nation Rally will happen on 11–17 August; it begins in Surat Thani, Thailand, and can conclude in Malaysia’s capital Kuala Lumpur. Toyota is the reigning race winner.
