PWC: Sandberg credits X-Bow’s consistency in GTS win

Hardly a surprise for the opening rounds of a racing season, it was definitely a weekend of new cars winning in Pirelli World Challenge at Circuit of The Americas. On Sunday it was the turn for the new KTM X-Bow GT4 to take victory in GTS at the hands of Brett Sandberg. Sandberg started from the pole after setting the fast lap in Saturday's race, and despite race-long pressure from Saturday winner (and Sandberg's former teammate at Compass360 in Touring Car) Lawson Aschenbach in the Blackdog Speed Shop Chevrolet Camaro, stayed out front for the length of the race.

"The car was super consistent throughout the entire race," Sandberg said of his ANSA Motorsports X-Bow. "These guys worked really hard in conjunction with Reiter Engineering and they've done a really good job of preparing this car. It's just nothing but perfect throughout the entire run."

Sandberg attributed that consistency to a few things: "It's almost certainly the lighter weight. I don't know what the base weight of the Camaro is, but my estimate is it's almost 1200 pounds lighter. so that certainly plays a significant role in tire degradation. Between that and the setup we have on the car ... it's not crazy aggressive, and that's something we went back and forth on. We could have had a car that would be a bit quicker, certainly at the beginning of the race, but I opted for something that would be more consistent throughout the longer run."

As easy as Sandberg's Sunday race looked, the weekend was not without its tribulations. The team – and the Pirelli World Challenge technical staff – discovered an overboost issue. As a result, the team lost its starting positions, including Dore Chaponick Jr.'s pole.

To eliminate the problem that occurred under certain conditions beyond the team's control, Sandberg noted, the series reduced the max engine speed by 1000 rpm in fifth and sixth gears. That, Sandberg said, reduced the car's top speed by six or seven miles per hour at the end of COTA's back straight. That may have been a blessing, as others had noted the car's advantage in outright speed, and the reduction kept the racing close.

It will be interesting to see which, if any, cars - the lighter, more nimble GT4 machines or the pony cars – have an edge when the series hits the runways and streets of St. Petersburg next week.