RealTime Racing Acura TLX GT Wins Class, Second Overall at Pikes Peak
RealTime Racing and Peter Cunningham dominate at Pikes Peak.
RealTime Racing owner Peter Cunningham has conquered Pikes Peak, taking a class win and second place overall in his Acura TLX GT. Cunningham finished second only to repeat winner Romain Dumas’ Honda-powered, highly modified Norma M20.
Cunningham ran the 12.42-mile course in just 9:33.797, which smashed the existing record in the Pikes Peak Open class. Dumas set that record previously in a Porsche 911, but Cunningham and the TLX GT went 13 seconds quicker than Dumas’ Porsche time.
This was the maiden trip up the mountain for both 55-year-old Cunningham and the two-year-old RealTime Racing TLX GT. RealTime campaigned two such TLXs, powered by twin-turbo 3.5-liter HPD V6s, in Pirelli World Challenge in 2015.
After qualifying second overall, he ran second on the road for non-bikes. Cunningham’s time cleared Clint Vahsholtz by 1.95 seconds to finish second overall with a strong fourth sector near the top of the mountain. That made him the highest-finishing rookie in the field for Rookie of the Year honors and the highest-finishing American.
Overall winner Dumas clocked a 9:05.672 for the victory. That came in considerably slower than his previous time in 2016. However, the Frenchman’s third win at Pikes Peak came with a turbocharged Honda K20 pushing his all-wheel drive Norma hard with the quickest times in three of the four sectors.
More Acuras blitz the Mountain: NSX, TLX, motorcyles and a Quad?!
Acura entered two more cars driven by brothers James and Nick Robinson. James took a 2017 Acura NSX to third in the Time Attack 1 class with a blistering 10:03.433. That improved on Nick’s time in an NSX last year by more than 25 seconds.
This year, Nick ran in the Exhibition class with a new Acura TLX A-Spec. He threw down a very impressive 11:03.655, which was the 32nd quickest of the hill climb’s 66 finishers.
Hondas also took home podiums in Lightweight Motorcycle (3rd – Darryl Lujan, 2013 Honda CFR450R) and Quad (2nd – Jeremy Harbison, 2005 Honda TRX450).
[Source: RealTime Racing]