Sayuki

Sayuki (沙雪 Sayuki, known as Simone in the Tokyopop version) is the navigator for Impact Blue. She acts as a co-pilot for Mako Sato, and works with her in her battle against Takumi Fujiwara in First Stage. Sayuki is a cheerful, outgoing girl always looking for good looking men. She's extremely flirtatious and loves to tease men and Mako herself, and also develops a small crush on Takumi Fujiwara after her and Mako's race against him. As Mako's navigator/co-driver, she is responsible for necessary callouts that may inform Mako of something important; for example, obstacles in the course, oncoming traffic, specific braking zones, etc. Notably in the race against Takumi, she instructed Mako to spin out after she entered a corner too quickly and sharply, preventing to recover safely.

Sayuki and Mako are known as one of the best duo combinations in the Gunma area, and the best on Usui, only being beaten once by Akina's Eight Six.

The White Ghost of Akina
Extremely little is known about her past life, even her surname is not revealed in the manga nor the anime. What is known is that she met and befriended Mako Sato earlier on in life, and developed a love and passion for cars and racing. It is unknown when, but eventually, the two tackle Usui pass, their home course, with Sayuki as the navigator, and Mako as the primary driver. She technically does not own a car, but says that the Nissan SilEighty that she and Mako drive in is shared between them both.

Eventually, the two challenge Takumi Fujiwara, Akina's new downhill ace at the time, to a race on Usui pass. The two lose after Mako enters one of the corners too fast, and is told to spin out by Sayuki as they were unable to recover. Takumi swiftly avoids them and prevents an accident.

After the race, Sayuki invites Takumi and his friends, Itsuki Takeuchi, Koichiro Iketani and Kenji to a pool party, and slowly develops a crush on Takumi, not hesitating to hide it; calling him cute and loveable. She also teases Mako and Iketani, who both have feelings for each other, though a misunderstanding kept them both apart.

The Emperor
Shingo and Nakazato meet up with her in a family restaurant to talk and warn her and her team about the Emperor team's recent Gunma sweeps. Coincidentally, Nakazato begins to form a slight interest on her.

Later on when an Emperor scouting party, they battled with Mako and Sayuki. Soon after Mako wins the battle, they both along with the Shingo and Nakazato go to a snow park to enjoy their holidays together.

The New Eighty-Six
Some time later both her and Mako attend Takumi's rematch with Ryosuke in Akagi, noticing how much they both have improved since the last time.

Project - D Tochigi
Much later, Sayuki and Mako battles with two drivers in an Altezza at Usui when the latter two insulted them while they were doing practice runs there. Sayuki notes how much Mako has improved since the last time and was proud of her. She asks Mako to overtake the Altezza before the C-121 corner, which they do.

Some days later, while Mako and Sayuki was at a parking lot, when Sayuki accidentally spots Iketani there. He was shocked to see her, even more so on Mako. She teases him a bit on seeing him after a long time.

The Kanagawa Expedition
Further on in the series, Sayuki, along with Mako, attends Takumi's final race against Sidewinder's Shinji Inui, whom she says is extremely similar to Takumi in many ways. When Shinji later revealed to her and Mako that he was the final opponent of Takumi, they both were shocked. Later on when Takumi and Shinji came to the corner where spectators such as Sayuki and Mako were located, Shinji suddenly overtakes Takumi right in front of them, surprising them even more. Sayuki realizes that Shinji did that just so that he can impress Mako.

In the anime exclusive end credits seen in Final Stage, Sayuki is seen cheering with other Impact Blue fans to Mako at the Twin Ring Motegi racing circuit, who by now is a professional racer with her race tuned SilEighty.

Etymology

 * The name Sayuki means "sand" (沙) (sa) and "snow" (雪) (yuki).