The circuit, located within
Aso Kujū National Park, was built at a cost of $500 million by the wealthy real-estate developer and investment banker
Tomonori Tsurumaki who made headlines in 1989, when during a
Paris auction, he successfully bid a
Pablo Picasso painting
Les Noces de Pierrette for $51.3 million from his Tokyo hotel room. Following his successful bid, he announced that his painting was to hang at the art gallery of the auto racing resort, under development at the time. The circuit was designed by
Yoshitoshi Sakurai who was the project leader of the
Honda F1 team during the 1960s. Tsurumaki ordered 30
Buick powered US built single seater race cars called "Sabre Cars" for a race to take place on his circuit's grand opening, in November 1990 consisting of a mixture of invited US
CART drivers such as
Stan Fox,
Johnny Rutherford,
Dick Simon,
Gary and
Tony Bettenhausen, against local Japanese drivers. After the grand opening, Tsurumaki planned on a series with the cars, known as
Formula Crane 45. A few races were run in 1991, with only a handful of cars competing. The only major international race held at Autopolis was the final race of the
1991 World Sportscar Championship season, the
1991 430km of Autopolis, which was won by
Michael Schumacher and
Karl Wendlinger in a
Mercedes-Benz C291 fielded by
Sauber. To promote the venue's intention to host a Formula One race, it sponsored the
Benetton Formula One team in 1990 and 1991. The cars featured prominent Autopolis logos. Visitors to the WSC event criticized the track for being too remote to the hotels which required a several hour bus ride and felt that it was unsuitable for a
Formula One race. Following the bankruptcy and collapse of Tsurumaki's company
Nippon Tri-Trust in 1993 (the year the track was supposed to hold an F1 race), the circuit and other assets he owned ended up in the hands of
Hazama who was responsible for the construction of the race track. Ultimately, the track's F1 event slot for the Asian GP on
11 April 1993 was given to
Donington Park, and
TI Circuit Aida would host a second Japanese race in Formula One calendar in
1994, but suffered from the same location-related criticism and was removed at the end of the
following season. By 1995, the company offered the site for sale at 10% of its build cost which consisted of three
hotels,
swimming pools and an
artificial ski slope. Some of Tsurumaki's assets, such as paintings, remained in a
bank vault waiting to be sold. Autopolis first hosted a
Super GT race in
1999, the season-ending exhibition race, which was won by
Tom Coronel and
Hidetoshi Mitsusada in a
Honda NSX-GT fielded by
Nakajima Racing. After a three-year absence, the circuit has regularly been hosting races in the series since 2003, although with some exceptions. Autopolis first held a
Super Formula race in
2006, and with some exceptions, the track has regularly been part of the series since then. Autopolis was purchased by
Kawasaki Motors in 2005. The circuit currently holds events for the
Super GT as well as
D1 Grand Prix,
Super Formula,
MFJ Superbike and
Super Taikyu. In March 2019, the circuit was added to the video game
Gran Turismo Sport through a game update. It has also been featured in
Need for Speed: ProStreet,
Need for Speed: Shift,
Shift 2: Unleashed, and
Gran Turismo 7. ==The circuit==