Like a bull rider in a Texas rodeo, Mark Wilkins grabbed the reins of his No. 38 turbocharged Optima and rode it to a well-deserved and hard-fought second-place finish Sunday in Round Five of the Pirelli World Challenge (PWC) at the world-renowned Circuit of the Americas (COTA) in Austin, Texas. The relentless Texas heat wreaked havoc on drivers and tires alike, but Wilkins managed the race well from the driver’s seat and held off Jack Baldwin’s hard-charging Porsche Cayman S for the second step on the podium after a late caution flag bunched up the field of 51 cars with less than 10 minutes to go.
“It was a great weekend for Kia Racing. To grab our first podium of the year feels darn good. The Kinetic crew did an awesome job preparing the No. 38 Optima, and the adjustments they made for Sunday’s race paid dividends,” said Wilkins, who had never driven COTA until this weekend. “We learned a lot from Round Four on Saturday about tire wear, so on Sunday we focused on being patient and more consistent with the car. The Optima performs so well that, naturally, you want to push it, but we had to make sure we had traction left at the end of the race, and I think our results show that we did a good job of tire management on Sunday.”
Wilkins’ podium finish moved him up from fourth to third in the Driver Championship as the series turns to another doubleheader weekend in Detroit at the end of May.
Teammate Nic Jönsson drove his No. 36 turbocharged Optima to fifth place in Round Four on Saturday, following fourth-placed Wilkins across the line. Kia Racing’s momentum continued into Sunday, with the Optimas running third and fourth throughout much of Round Five’s 50-minute contest. With a little over 10 minutes remaining, however, a full-course caution bunched up the field, and on the ensuing restart, Jönsson made heavy contact with the second-place Camaro heading up the hill into turn one. The jarring hit broke the front-right suspension and brake rotor, and Jönsson subsequently collided with the race-leading Camaro, damaging his own car to such an extent that he was unable to continue. Jönsson was credited with a 22nd-place finish and slipped to ninth in the Driver Championship.
“We had a really good car Sunday, and after the caution flag, I felt like we had something for the GTS leaders; I had been saving the tires for the end and this was my chance to make a move,” said Jönsson, who was running third at the time of the incident. “I had a run on the second-place car heading up the hill, but everyone is battling for every inch of race track out there and we just got together. Once that happened, I lost my brakes and couldn’t avoid further contact. It’s unfortunate I collected Lawson while he was in the lead.”
Kia Motors America remains third in the Manufacturer point standings following COTA as the PWC series now turns to the Motor City on May 31-June 2 for Rounds Six and Seven.
Article and image courtesy of Kia News.
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