Racer’s Edge Acura NSX GT3 Evo Goes Flag-To-Flag For Sunday Sonoma Win
Trent Hindman and Shelby Blackstock lead every lap in dominant Sunday victory
Racers Edge Acura NSX GT3 Evo wins poles for both Somona GT events
SONOMA, Calif. (August 9, 2020) – The Racers Edge Motorsports #93 Acura NSX GT3 Evo showed its power on a sunny Sonoma weekend as the Silver Class driver pairing of Trent Hindman and Shelby Blackstock won Sunday’s SRO Motorsport GT series race in wire-to-wire fashion.
The striking red-and-white Acura NSX ruled Friday qualifying, winning the poles for Saturday’s and Sunday’s races around the 2.499-mile Sonoma Raceway. The team used the top starting spot to take a huge lead in Saturday’s race before a penalty blunted its charge, but there was no such drama on Sunday as Hindman and Blackstock dominated all 51 laps.
Hindman led Sunday’s event and was running away from the field before the driver change window opened up, only to see the advantage erased by a lengthy caution period for contact between two GT Sports Club competitors. Undaunted, Hindman sprinted away from the field on the Lap 13 restart and built a sizeable lead heading into the mandatory driver change pit stop.
A flawless driver change saw the Racer’s Edge team widen its advantage over the Mercedes of Colin Braun, and Blackstock spent the rest of his afternoon expanding the lead on his way to the checkered flag. The victory was the third of the year for the #93 team and its first since it swept the opening weekend at Circuit of the Americas.
Unfortunately, a pit-lane issue ended the team’s run to Victory Lane in Saturday’s opener. Having held the lead from the drop of the green flag, the team pitted too early to make its mandatory driver change, resulting in an 87-second penalty. The miscue dropped the team to sixth in the final results, although the duo did earn a victory in the Silver class.
The Racer’s Edge team played one car short this weekend in Sonoma as the defending series Pro/Am champion #80 Acura NSX GT3 Evo driven by Martin Barkey and Kyle Marcelli was unable to compete due to complications with travel restrictions brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. The team is hoping to be back in action for Rounds 7 and 8.
The win this weekend is the fourth in six GT World Challenge races for the Acura NSX GT3 Evo, which won team championships in both IMSA GTD and the SRO GT World Challenge series in 2019. The car, sold and supported by HPD in North America, runs in both Sprint and Endurance racing competition around the world.
Social media content and video links from this weekend’s Acura Motorsports activity at Sonoma Raceway are available on HPD’s Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/HondaRacingHPD) and on Twitter at (https://twitter.com/HondaRacing_HPD).
Next
The GT World Challenge Series will journey back across the country for Rounds 7 and 8 of the 2020 season, which take place at the 4.048-mile permanent road course at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, August 28-30.
Quotes
Trent Hindman (#93 Racers Edge Motorsports Acura NSX GT3 Evo): I am really proud to be part of this Racer’s Edge Motorsports crew. They gave us a fantastic Acura NSX GT3 and Shelby did a hell of a job in the race and with the qualifying.”
Shelby Blackstock (#93 Racers Edge Motorsports Acura NSX GT3 Evo): “We WON race 2!! Every part of today’s race was executed to perfection! Started from the pole, Trent [Hindman, starting driver]
had a killer first stint, the Racers Edge Motorsports team produced an amazing pit stop, getting our total pit delta down to .8 of a second! Thank you boys!! Let’s keep it going!”