It’s safe to say that K-PAX Racing driver Jordan Pepper was peerless in the opening round of the 2022 Fanatec GT World Challenge America powered by AWS at Sonoma Raceway. He and Andrea Caldarelli swept the weekend double-header at K-PAX’s home race for the second year in a row. Barring a catastrophe, the “CaldaPepper” duo is the overwhelming favourite to win their second set of Pro Cup titles in 2022, after winning ten races in 2021, K-PAX’s first year as a Lamborghini customer team.
Pepper himself was exceptionally strong at the wheel of the black #1 K-PAX Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO this past weekend. Whether he outqualified the field by more than three and a half seconds in a wet qualifying session for Saturday’s first race, or whether he was posting the fastest average of ten race laps in each of his two race stints, and putting victory well out of reach of the competition in the process.
“I think it’s great that we came out strong after last year,” Pepper said in an interview with DSC this weekend. “When you have such a dominant year, the only thing you can do is kind of go backwards a bit if you settle down, but that’s not how the team is.”
“The team is very much a motivated group of guys. So we’re always striving to be better, to perfect what we can.”
“I think the guys worked extremely hard throughout the winter, in studying every single race that we did last year, all the data going through it. We had lots of meetings, lots of phone calls – I know they had loads of stuff going on with Lamborghini and great support from their side as well. So it’s good to start the year off again in P1.”
“The attitude that we have is that we just want to keep pushing the boundaries, [and] keep pushing where we’re at.”
K-PAX are, of course, already off to the perfect start of the defence of their GTWC America Pro Cup titles. That’s one of three goals that Pepper and K-PAX have set for themselves this season – to win another series title.
Beyond that, the South African driver is also looking forward to having two cracks at the Intercontinental GT Challenge with K-PAX, the first of which will be the 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps on 30-31 July, where Marco Mapelli will link up with the team.
“The three of us, I think it’s a strong lineup. Lambo’s always really quick there, so I think we will be really competitive,” remarks Pepper, who will be vying for his – and Lamborghini’s – first overall win in the crown jewel of the SRO racing calendar.
The Indianapolis 8 Hour race, which also serves as the de facto grand finale for SRO Motorsports America, is the other IGTC event that Pepper and K-PAX are eager to attack. They finished third overall last year in an atrition-filled race.
“Those two races (Spa and Indianapolis) [are] where we’re going to be up against all the European guys again. And I think we had a good taste of it last year where we gauged against them,” Pepper said. “I don’t think we had [the] outright pace for P3 last year in Indy, but we were definitely competitive to be up there. And that’s why we rewarded the team with a podium.”
“We just got to keep using this championship, as well – to keep pushing ourselves, keep leveling up, keep driving forward and motivating ourselves for making sure we are ready to go back to Europe.”
Pepper also gave his initial feedback on Pirelli’s new P Zero DHF range of racing tyres, which debuted in SRO competition this year. “The new tyre is definitely quite different in feeling and feedback. I think it does require a bit of a change in setup, and a change in ideas,” Pepper said.
“And we haven’t quite understood it 100 percent. I would say it’s too early to say – first round of the year, we had a two day test beforehand, which was quite disrupted by the weather. So I don’t think we fully got our heads around it. But, I feel like we’ve got our heads around it a lot quicker than a couple of the other guys here already.”
“That goes also with the strong link between Lamborghini and K-PAX. There’s a good passageway with information being passed backwards and forwards – so what they also learn in Europe, they pass over to us here.”
“It doesn’t quite reflect on these types of tracks [in America]. It’s not copy paste. But I think it gave us a good head start to understand what we were expecting.”
“And as a driver, is it a better tyre or a worse tyre? I can’t really comment. It’s hard to say – it’s not like a noticeable difference, and the characteristics of the Pirelli is still very similar, but I think it’s shown to be good in Europe already and shown to a bit better on tyre degradation.”
Next up on the SRO Motorsports America calendar is a trip to the all-new Ozarks International Raceway. Pepper will be one of the first drivers to race in anger around the winding 6.3 kilometre circuit boasting over 360 metres of elevation change. And he’s relishing the opportunity to attack the circuit that’s been tenatively nicknamed the “Missouri Nördschliefe.”
“I’ve looked at aerial footage, I’ve looked at a couple onboards of road cars driving around, and it looks badass, it looks pretty cool,” said Pepper.
“I like that it’s got no room for error. I think it’s got the American style to it – that it’s really a ballsy track which is good and fun to drive!”
“Hard to say what happens when we turn up there, I think. Nobody’s raced around the track in anger, so it’s gonna present some problems, of course. I think every new track has its pros and its cons.”
“But I think as a whole, looking at it, I think it’s going to be a great venue to go to, a great track – something unique and special, especially in America. [We’re] so excited that we’re going to be the first series going there.”
“I also like going to new tracks. I like learning tracks, I feel like it’s a strength of mine to learn tracks quick. It’s cool that we’re all starting from zero.”
Feature image © Bob Chapman
Additional images © Regis Lefebure / SRO / Ozarks International Raceway
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