Akinori Ogata will run his first NASCAR national series race of 2023 when he enters the Craftsman Truck Series at Atlanta Motor Speedway. He will drive the #46 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro for G2G Racing.
“I am glad we could get this deal done,” said team owner Tim Viens. “Ogata has been a significant part of NASCAR’s international drivers that came into the sport and I am happy he is with us.”
He is one of four Japanese drivers to have competed in the Truck Series alongside Shigeaki Hattori, Kenji Momota, and Kenkō Miura. Miura and Ogata are both active drivers who made Truck starts in 2022, albeit in one-offs as Ogata crashed out at Darlington with Reaume Brothers Racing while Miura—a NASCAR Whelen Euro Series regular—was a road course ringer for RBR. Hattori also remains involved in the sport as the owner of Truck team Hattori Racing Enterprises, while Momota has covered NASCAR as an analyst following his driving career.
Ogata made his Truck début in 2014 and has thirteen career starts to his name with a best finish of eighteenth at New Hampshire in 2015. He raced at Atlanta between 2017 and 2018 and in 2021, all prior to its reconfiguration, retiring in his first two tries and placing thirty-seventh in the last.
The Kanagawa native mainly races in late models, with four Limited Late Model victories at Hickory since 2022; he is the first Japanese driver to win a race at the track. That year also saw him enter four Xfinity races for MBM Motorsports, missing two and retiring from the others.
G2G fielded the #46 for Norm Benning at Daytona but missed the show, followed by Brennan Poole exiting Las Vegas with a rear gear problem.
