take the final two victories of the year. BMW Motorsport, who had scored McLaren's only victories that year, managed second in the teams championships, while Team Davidoff took a distant third. Although McLaren had successfully outdone Porsche, they were simply unable to compete with the power of the new Mercedes-Benz. BMW officially left the project at the end of 1997 in order to build their own Le Mans Prototype project, the BMW V12 LM. McLaren, realizing that the F1 could no longer compete against an even more evolved Mercedes CLK-LM, decided to pull out factory backing for 1998. Team Davidoff and Parabolica Motorsports, aligned with BBA Competition, attempted to continue with their aged cars in 1998, but could finish no better than fifth in a single race. Team Davidoff were the only ones to score points that season, finishing 6th in the teams championship. After 1998 the GT1 class was abolished due to the dominance by Mercedes-Benz, and McLaren F1s never raced in FIA GT again. All Japan Grand Touring Championship In 1996, Team Goh of Japan purchased two F1 GTRs of 1996-spec, chassis #13R and #14R, for participation in the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship's (JGTC) GT500 class under the name Team Lark. Debuting at the opening round at Suzuka Circuit, the Lark team took a 1-2 finish, with winners Naoki Hattori and Ralf Schumacher. At the following round at Fuji, David Brabham and John Nielsen would take victory for the Lark McLaren. However, in the next two rounds, the Japanese rivals would overcome the McLarens, only to have Team Lark return to take victory in the final two rounds of the season. At the Sugo round, Lark badly damaged their one chassis, requiring them to borrow chassis #04R from GTC Competition as a replacement for the final JGTC round. With four victories on the season, Team Lark captured the GT500 teams championship ahead of factory squads from Toyota and Nissan. Team Lark's championship victory was the second season in JGTC/Super GT history where the GT500 class-winning car is not from a Japanese manufacturer; a Porsche 911 GT2 won the GT500 team's championship in 1995, although the driver championship was won by a Nissan driver that year. Team Lark would not return to defend their title in 1997 due to disputes with GT Association over car handicaps, and no McLarens raced in the series. McLarens would return though