Summarize

GT World Challenge America champions, South African GT3 racing star Jordan Pepper and his Italian co-driver Andrea Caldarelli driving with factory driver Mirko Bortolotti, brought their K-Pax Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 home a splendid third in the Intercontinental GT Challenge Indianapolis 8 Hour on Sunday. Although bittersweet in a way, the weekend’s world series podium proved the cherry on the top of a brilliant champion season for Pepper and Caldarelli.

“We knew the Indianapolis 8 Hour would be tough, racing against the best GT drivers and teams in the world,” Jordan explained. “We qualified eleventh and that put us in a good position for the race, but we picked up a puncture at the start. “That put us on the back foot, but we used some great strategy to get ourselves back into contention and actually lead the race, which was great. “It was so enjoyable to do a few laps in front!

“We never quite had the ultimate pace of the top Audis or the Ferraris, but we knew that we could handle them on strategy and we felt that we were on course for the win. “Unfortunately we were ultimately compromised by a weird call by race control and that cost us a real shot at victory. “There were several strange race control interventions through the race and we had a few, the last of which was just too much to fight back from.

“Anyway, I am really proud of our whole K-Pax Racing team and truly happy with my first year in America. “To wrap up the World Challenge America championship with nine race wins as we did and to stand on the ICGT podium at Indy was incredible. “Now I can’t wait to see what the future holds for me!”

The Indy 8 Hour was won by ICGT regulars Patric Niederhauser, Christopher Haase and Markus Winkelhock’s Audi R8 GT3 from Raffaele Marciello, Daniel Juncadella and Timur Boguslavski’s Mercedes-AMG GT3 and Pepper, Caldarelli and Bortolotti’s US-entered Lamborghini. The Intercontinental GT Challenge wraps up with the Kyalami 9 Hour in Johannesburg on Saturday 4 December.