Pirelli World Challenge Grand Prix of St. Petersburg Race One Debut
New Team Races in Lead Pack in Debuting Hot Wheels®, InvoicePrep, Voodoo Ride Porsche Cayman S
Jack Baldwin and the No. 68 Hot Wheels®/GTSport/Porsche Napleton Racing Cayman S scored a top-five GTS-class finish in the debuting team’s first race in the Pirelli World Challenge series late Saturday afternoon at the Grand Prix or St. Petersburg.
Baldwin turned in a clean but competitive run in the 50-minute sprint that was slowed by four caution periods, including the final one that forced the race to be finished under yellow flag conditions. Baldwin was in fifth place and in a position to challenge for another finishing spot or two at the time but instead settled for giving team lead partners Hot Wheels®, InvoicePrep and Voodoo Ride a solid result for the all-new effort in its maiden outing.
“It’s great to have the first race under our belts here,” Baldwin said. “Once again it’s a tribute to the guys and how hard they have worked. We got a top-five finish, which was a goal of ours, and we learned a lot. We have got some work to do, but that’s the way that racing goes. I am happy with it, I am very pleased with the effort, and the Hot Wheels® Cayman was fun to drive.”
The colorful new Team Hot Wheels™ Cayman S, which also features the eye-catching branding of Voodoo Ride and the InvoicePrep logo, has quickly become the most popular car in the Pirelli World Challenge paddock. Baldwin even felt the fan support during the race.
“We were just driving around slow under all those cautions and I was just waving to people,” Baldwin said. “Everybody was waving to me, some of them all the fans we have met throughout the weekend, so I was just waving back. That was kind of cool.”
Hot Wheels® and Baldwin – in cooperation with GTSport Racing and Porsche Napleton Racing (PNR) – are running a full-season GTS campaign in a Porsche Cayman S in the 2012 Pirelli World Challenge with lead partners Team Hot Wheels™, Invoice Prep and Voodoo Ride.
Baldwin and Hot Wheels® first joined forces to capture the 1992 SCCA-Pro Trans-Am Championship and now return a full 20 years later in search of more title-winning success in a premier SCCA-Pro division. The team’s car of choice is a Pirelli Cayman Interseries-based Porsche Cayman S that has been modified to compete in the GTS class. The car was built and will be maintained by PNR, the racing division of leading Chicago area Porsche dealer Napleton Porsche of Westmont, and will be entered by GTSport Racing.
Pirelli World Challenge action at the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg wraps up Sunday morning with Round 2 of this weekend’s doubleheader race schedule at 11 a.m. EDT with another 50-minute sprint.
The No. 68 Team Hot Wheels®/GTSport/Porsche Napleton Racing Cayman S is also supported by Napleton Porsche Motorsports, BBS, JRZ Suspension Engineering, StopTech, Jamestown Fish Restaurant, RaceLink, TPC, AIM, RS683 and Schnorr Art.
