JLOC was first founded in 1980 by a group of the
Lamborghini Miura owners due to difficulties with getting spare parts and maintenance of their cars. The original JLOC operated in the
Kansai region and was dissolved a few years later, but it was reformed in 1987 following Lamborghini's request. Isao Noritake, who had already become a member of the original JLOC, was elected as the chairman of the group upon its reformation. Seventeen members became part of the organization when JLOC held their first meeting in Sanza Villa,
Lake Hamana in 1988 and by 2000, more than 100 members had joined the organization. The first meeting in 1988 served as the inspiration for Team JLOC's usage of #88 as their primary number in racing competition.
JGTC / Super GT In the early 1990s, JLOC member Teruaki Terai wanted to take part in motorsport despite lacking a race car or a sponsor. In 1993, Terai managed to acquire a fire-damaged
Lamborghini Countach 25th Anniversary that he planned to convert into a race car for the recently established
All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship. Terai and Masahiko Mearashi, a former car magazine editor and a JLOC member, planned to reinforce the burnt chassis with a mono-plastic body with plans to enter the 1994 JGTC season, but by the spring of 1994 the project was still unfinished. JLOC, competing under the KEN WOLF with Terai Engineering name in
1994, was initially unable to enter the season opening race at
Fuji Speedway but they were requested to enter the race by the organizers after they heard the news of JLOC’s planned participation.
Circuit no Ōkami’s
mangaka Satoshi Ikezawa was invited by Mearashi to negotiate a deal with exotic car dealership Art Sports to supply a road-going Countach for JLOC. Due to the limited amount of time, the Countach was kept mostly stock but it received modifications to its bodywork, suspension, and engine. For 1995, JLOC requested Lamborghini to develop a
Diablo homologation special for JGTC competition. Three Diablo Jota’s were developed, two for competition purposes and one for road homologation; all three models still exist in Japan. The Diablo Jota would compete in all but one round of the
1995 season, scoring no championship points and a best finish of 13th at Sendai and Fuji respectively. Wada and Ikezawa were retained as the team’s drivers, although Ikezawa was replaced by Tatsuhiko Kanoumi for the final round at Mine. Tragedy struck the team that year, however, as Terai died from cancer in August. JLOC continued to campaign the Diablo Jota’s for the
1996 season, once again scoring no championship points at the end of the season. The licensing controversy meant that the JLOC Diablo only appeared in the NTSC-J version of
Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec at Lamborghini’s request and only made its return in
Gran Turismo 5, a year after Lamborghini’s introduction as a fully licensed manufacturer in 2009’s
Gran Turismo for the
PlayStation Portable. in 2005, the team's final year of competition in GT500. JLOC redeveloped the Diablo GT-1 into the Diablo JGT-1 for the
2001 season, which featured a reworked chassis and suspension along with other parts specially built for JGTC. The Diablo JGT-1 was raced for three seasons but despite this, the car continued to score little success as it struggled to compete with the factory-backed entries in GT500. JLOC then switched to a brand new
Lamborghini Murciélago R-GT for the
2004 season, labeled as the RG-1 by the team, but a lack of spare parts forced the team to race the Diablo JGT-1 for the fourth round at Tokachi. JLOC continued to be uncompetitive with the Murciélago R-GT in GT500 and when JGTC was rebranded into
Super GT in the
2005 season, JLOC began to compete in the GT300 class after they homologated the R-GT for GT300 regulations. The #88 team would also score one pole position at
Sportsland Sugo and finished 11th in the GT300 standings that year while the #87 team would finish 19th, having scored 3 points finishes and one fastest lap in Suzuka. RG-3 (pictured in 2011) was developed to replace the aging Murciélago RG-1. JLOC expanded further into a four-car team in
2007, entering two self-developed
Lamborghini Gallardo RG-3s alongside the two Murciélago RG-1 entries. The team downscaled into a three-car team in the following season as the team phased out one of the Murciélago entries before the Murciélago RG-1 was placed into retirement at the end of the
2009 season. The team competed with three Gallardo RG-3s for the
2010 season and scored their best championship finish at the time with Yamanishi and future series champion
Yuhi Sekiguchi in the #86 team, who finished 9th in the GT300 standings after scoring one podium, one pole position and five points finishes. GT3 in 2014. JLOC continued to enter three RG-3s in
2011 before expanding to a four-car team once more in
2012 after the team acquired two FIA-
GT3 specification Gallardos.
Manabu Orido and
Atsushi Yogo, racing the GT3-specification Gallardo, recorded the team’s new best place finish in the standings as the duo finished 8th as the highest finishing team to not score a race win that year. By
2013, the team had fully phased out the RG-3s and returned into a three-car team, all of them fielding GT3-specification Lamborghini Gallardos. JLOC downscaled further into a two-car team in
2014 and scored one win at Sugo, courtesy of Orido and
Takayuki Aoki in the #88 Gallardo GT3. JLOC continued to field the Gallardo GT3’s for another season before they switched to the
Lamborghini Huracán GT3 in the
2016 season. The flagship number 88 JLOC car was a consistent points scorer on the team’s first season with the Huracán GT3, finishing 11th in the championship with the driver pairing of Orido and
Kazuki Hiramine after scoring 6 top-10 finishes. JLOC’s performance was inconsistent in the following year, but Orido and Hiramine finished 10th in the standings and both JLOC cars finished on the podium at the
Suzuka 1000km race. Orido left the team at the end of the 2017 season and was replaced by Lamborghini factory driver Marco Mapelli in the
2018 season. JLOC scored two pole positions that year with the #88 Huracán GT3, but was unable to score a victory as the Team JLOC cars finished 10th and 11th at the end of the season. Mapelli returned to Europe in the following year and was replaced by
Takashi Kogure, who had been released from his Honda GT500 factory seat. Since Hiramine was signed by
Kondo Racing in the off-season, Yuya Motojima was transferred from the #87 team to join Kogure in the #88 car. Kogure and Motojima would bring JLOC their best-ever championship finish to date as they finished the year in 7th with 36.5 points and 2 podium finishes. The #87 car, primarily driven by Tsubasa Takahashi and former GT300 champion
André Couto with
Kiyoto Fujinami entered on the endurance races, finished 8th after winning the Fuji GT 500 Mile Race. Couto and Lamborghini factory driver
Dennis Lind were due to compete with the team in
2020, but the advent of the
COVID-19 pandemic meant that they were unable to foresee their deal with JLOC that year. JLOC would eventually retain Kogure, Motojima and Takahashi for 2020 as Shinnosuke Yamada, who raced with Team UpGarage as their endurance race driver last year, was signed by JLOC to partner Takahashi in the #87 car for the full season. The team struggled in 2020 as they only scored a total of three points finishes with Kogure and Motojima ending up as the best finishing JLOC car in 13th place on the standings. Kogure and Motojima continued to race the #88 JLOC car in
2021 as former IndyCar driver
Kosuke Matsuura and
Natsu Sakaguchi was signed to create an all-new driver line-up in the #87 car. Kogure and Motojima enjoyed a better season that year as they were consistently finishing in the points, eventually finishing that year in 8th place with 1 podium finish and five points finishes. Matsuura and Sakaguchi, on the other hand, continued to struggled as they only recorded one points finish at Sugo, eventually finishing 20th in the driver standings. Despite this, all four drivers would be retained by the team for the
2022 season. The pairing of Kogure and Motojima went on to finish 13th in the drivers standings, having finished in the top-10 positions five times. Matsuura and Sakaguchi enjoyed a better season as they scored JLOC's lone podium finish of the year in the final round at
Motegi and finished 15th in the driver standings. The team also played a crucial role in the championship as two late overtakes from both JLOC cars at Motegi, including a last-lap overtake on GAINER's Ryuichiro Tomita by Kogure, allowed Kondo Racing to clinch the GT300 title after the right front wheel of Kondo's
Nissan GT-R GT3 came off the car midway through the race. JLOC retained all four drivers for
2023 and initially started the year with a pair of Huracán GT3 Evo's. Before Round 4 at
Fuji, the #88 car of Kogure and Motojima was upgraded into the Evo 2 spec while their old car was handed over to the #87 team after their initial car was written off after a heavy crash with
Nismo's
Tsugio Matsuda at
Suzuka. JLOC planned to also introduce a second Huracán GT3 Evo 2 for the #87 team later in the season, but it was scrapped due to Balance of Performance concerns. The upgraded machinery allowed Kogure and Motojima to tie JLOC's best championship finish of seventh, having scored victory in the last round at
Motegi. Matsuura and Sakaguchi in the older specification Huracán GT3 Evo finished 15th, finishing on the podium in the second visit to
Suzuka. They were due to receive their Huracán GT3 Evo 2 in time for the start of the
2024 season, however delays from the Lamborghini side meant that the #87 team only received theirs starting from Round 4 at
Fuji. The team enjoyed their best season to date as Kogure and Motojima claimed JLOC's first GT300 championship title with four race wins, the most for a GT300 team since
Team Taisan Jr. and its driver pairing of
Shingo Tachi and
Keiichi Suzuki secured five wins in the
1998 season.
24 Hours of Le Mans JLOC first attempted to enter the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2005, but they failed to secure an entry. They entered the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the first time in
2006 with a Lamborghini Murciélago RG-1LM, a Murciélago R-GT that was modified by JLOC for endurance racing. JLOC’s Super GT drivers
Marco Apicella,
Yasutaka Hinoi, and
Koji Yamanishi would share the driving duties for the team’s debut at Le Mans. The team completed 283 laps but stopped with three hours left in the race and did not complete the final lap, leaving them non-classified in the final results. The team returned to Le Mans the next year with a driver line-up of Apicella, Yamanishi and Atsushi Yogo. JLOC received logistical support from
DAMS for their participation in the
2007 race.{{cite news|url=https://www.24h-lemans.com/en/news/24-hours-of-le-mans-when-the-memorable-lamborghini-murcielago-took-on-the-lmgt-1-class-56264|title=24 HOURS OF LE MANS – WHEN THE MEMORABLE LAMBORGHINI MURCIELAGO TOOK ON THE LMGT1 CLASS JLOC didn’t enter the
2008 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans and only returned for the
2009 edition with Apicella, Yogo, and Yutaka Yamagishi as the team’s drivers. JLOC suffered numerous mechanical issues throughout practice and qualifying that left them unable to qualify for the race.
ACO, however, allowed the team to start the race. As Apicella and a number of mechanics had flown back home after the team’s initial failure to qualify, JLOC elected to start and park the car after completing just one lap. For the
2010 race, JLOC was given an entry after the team won the Okayama 1000km race of
2009 that made up the sole
Asian Le Mans Series round of that year. Yogo, Yamanishi, and Hiroyuki Iiri are elected to drive JLOC’s newly-prepared Murciélago LP670 R-SV for the race. The team retired at the 18th hour mark after only completing 138 laps due to suffering from numerous puncture and transmission problems. JLOC never received manufacturer support and struggled to be competitive during their four Le Mans attempts. In an interview with Motorsport.com in 2022, JLOC’s team principal Isao Noritake believes that the project struggled to be competitive because Audi lost interest in the Murciélago R-GT project, forcing JLOC to compete independently despite being the sole representative for Lamborghini at Le Mans. == Racing record ==