Drew with VW
A few weeks ago I wrote about the Pirelli WC series and shared a video walk-around of Tristan Herbert’s 2012 Jetta GLI race car. Today, I’m excited to update you on the latest results from Tristan’s HPA/Brimtek Motorsports team, along with updates from the APR Motorsports team that recently won a Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge (CTSCC) series race in a GTI.
Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge Series
The APR Motorsports team competed at Road America last weekend with their MK5 GTI in the Street Tuner (ST) class, a class for smaller 4-cylinder or 6-cylinder compact sedans, coupes and roadsters. While APR had a few Volkswagens in the field, it was the rookie team of David Cheng and Aleks Altberg that took the win in the number 171 APR VW GTI, a car built in 2008 when the team joined the series.
The number 171 GTI took the lead early on in the race after APR Motorsports teammate Nate Norenberg pulled the number 161 APR VW GTI in for a driver change with Josh Hurley. Cool fact: both Nate and Josh are former Jetta TDI Cup drivers. Unfortunately, the number 161 car had to retire 20 minutes before the race ended after it was caught up in a multiple-car incident.
Aleks Altberg drove consistently through the middle of the race to make sure the car would be competitive during the final laps, yet never fell out of the top three positions. When the race restarted after the fifth caution period, Altberg was in second. He drove the GTI to the lead with a little over 40 minutes remaining and held on to first place until the checkered flag waved.
If you want to watch the action as it happened, the race will be broadcast on the SPEED Channel on Sunday, July 8, at 12:00 PM. The next race will be the Continental Tire 150 at Watkins Glen International Raceway in New York on Saturday, June 30 at 3:00 PM ET.
Pirelli World Challenge Series
APR Motorsports wasn’t the only team racing Volkswagens to visit victory lane last weekend. The HPA/Brimtek Motorsports team won the first of three races during the Pirelli WC series’ Canadian Tire Motorsport Park Doubleheader in Clarington, Ontario. Jeff Altenburg drove the number 43 2012 GLI to a win after starting in sixth position.
Jeff had quite a battle for the lead through the race. The top seven drivers all finished within 2.5 seconds of each other, including Jeff’s teammate Tristan Herbert who battled his way up to sixth position after starting 12th.
Unfortunately, the second race didn’t go as well for the team; Jeff made contact with another vehicle while fighting for the lead and Tristan had to retire early because of a mechanical issue from a previous incident. Neither car was able to start the third race.
The next Pirelli WC race Tristan and Jeff will compete in will be at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, August 3-5. Watch it live on www.world-challengetv.com.
Do you have a race track near you that you like to go to?