With nearly 180 Formula 1 World Championship appearances between them over 12 combined seasons, Heikki Kovalainen of Finland and Kamui Kobayashi of Japan were two of F1’s pound-for-pound best talents of the last ten seasons.

Now, in a field also boasting 2009 World Champion Jenson Button at Honda, and second-generation F1 alumni Kazuki Nakajima at Lexus, Kobayashi and Kovalainen will form a veritable “super team” at Lexus Team SARD, when the 2016 GT500 Champion Kovalainen and the Toyota Gazoo Racing superstar Kobayashi join forces to drive the #39 Denso Kobelco SARD Lexus LC500 – already a legendary Super GT car in its own right.

It took SARD twenty-two seasons, but in 2016, led by Kovalainen and Kohei Hirate, the team rallied over the final races of the season to win the GT500 championship from Nissan and NISMO. 2017, however, saw a year of frustrating setbacks.

They did score a memorable victory at Sportsland SUGO, but were embroiled in a number of on-track incidents – including two costly crashes at Autopolis and the Suzuka 1000km – which left them mired in the middle of the table, 8th place in the GT500 Drivers’ Championship, 6th in the Teams’ Championship.

It was a difficult decision to let go of two-time GT500 champion Hirate, but it is a massive coup for SARD to land the services of 31-year-old Kobayashi from Amagasaki, Japan – who in his five seasons in F1 with Toyota, Sauber, and Caterham, became a crowd-pleaser to the international audience with his fearless style. The pinnacle of his F1 career came at the 2012 Japanese Grand Prix, where he became only the third Japanese driver to score a World Championship podium finish, succeeding Aguri Suzuki and Takuma Sato.

Kobayashi has since moved on to focus on the FIA World Endurance Championship with Toyota Gazoo Racing, and with Super GT now part of his docket, he will be triple-enrolled in WEC, Super GT, and his fourth season in the Japanese Super Formula Championship.

Kobayashi finished 5th in the WEC Drivers’ Championship, with three podium finishes – and at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, he set the fastest lap ever recorded (by average speed) in qualifying to take pole position in his Toyota TS050 Hybrid. In Super Formula, he finished 7th in the championship, driving KCMG to their best-ever results in the series and their very first podium finish – 2nd place at Twin Ring Motegi.

And last August, in the Suzuka 1000km, Kobayashi made a one-off debut at the Suzuka 1000km, where he finished 4th for Lexus Team WedsSport Bandoh – best of the LC500s in that event.

He partners Kovalainen, who raced for seven seasons between Renault, McLaren, Caterham, and the second and third incarnations of Lotus from 2007 to 2013. This will be his fourth season in Super GT, and all aboard the wheel of the iconic Denso SARD Lexus.

2018 will mark the tenth anniversary of “Heikki-San”‘s only F1 Grand Prix victory, in Hungary with McLaren Mercedes. He won the GT500 Championship in 2016, and already has two victories and 19 top-10 finishes in his 24 starts since 2015.

Since departing F1, the 36-year-old from Suomussalmi, Finland has also rekindled his love for rallying – even competing in a handful of national-level rallies in Japan during his downtime from Super GT, though he has turned down offers to join Toyota Gazoo Racing WRC and their all-Scandinavian squadron.

Katsuyuki Sato will again return as SARD’s team director, with Kotaro Tanaka, their chief engineer from the 2016 championship season, also returning to that post.

As is the case with Kazuki Nakajima, Kobayashi will be asked to fulfill his duties with Toyota Gazoo Racing on the weekend of May 5, and will be forced to miss the Fuji GT 500km Race on May 4. Japanese press have reported that Toyota Young Driver, Sho Tsuboi, will be called up to make his GT500 debut alongside Kovalainen.