| New Gray Mesh Wheels |
6/8/98 |
HPI-Sponsored Indy Lights Car Wins Again!!
Click here to download the high-resolution image!
On May 23, during a race shown ABC, the Epson #16 blue and silver car (co-sponsored by HPI Racing!!), driven by Shigeaki Hattori, was driven to its second victory of the year at the Motorola 300, at Gateway International Raceway in Madison, Illinois. The first race of the season at Homestead Raceway in Florida on March 15, 1998 was Shigeaki's first career Indy Lights win, and made him points leader in the overall championship series for 1998. Shigeaki came in 11th place at the Long Beach Grand Prix on April 5th, 1998. Shigeaki Hattori is currently second in the points race, behind Christiano de Matta, who has also won two races so far this year. Stay tuned to this site for further updates as the season progresses, or visit the official Indy Lights site for up to the minute details!
Shigeaki Hattori has been racing professionally since 1989, starting in the FJ-1600 class in Japan, and has worked himself through the Toyota Atlantic series up to Indy Lights, which is considered "the final step on the way to the top" towards the V-8 CART Indy cars. Indy Lights was designed to be the "Official Development Series" of CART, and has produced many of CART's big-name drivers, like Paul Tracy, Andre Ribiero, Bryan Herta and many others. Indy Lights cars use identical Lola T97/20 chassis, Dayton tires and sealed 425 hp V6 engines to ensure equal competition. Four different types of race circuits are used to prepare Indy Lights drivers for CART racing: superspeedways, short ovals, permanent road courses and temporary street circuits.
The sponsors for Shigeaki's #16 car include: EPSON America, out of Torrance, California, a leading worldwide manufacturer of computers, printers and digital cameras; Ibaraki Toyopet, a Toyota automobile retailer in Ibaraki, Japan; MCI, a telecommunications leader; HPI Racing; and Asics, a leading shoe manufacturer. Also sponsoring the Indy Lights race series is PPG, Omega, Bosch, Sea-Doo, Ski-Doo, Johsoh, and Three Bond.
The PPG-Dayton Indy Light series offers tomorrow's CART Indy racers today, and always provides spectators with excellent racing action. Be sure to check out the blue, silver and white paint scheme, which Kent Clausen of HPI designed! Watch for the HPI logo on the inside of the rear wing of the #16 EPSON car!
HPI USA - 15321 Barranca Pkwy - Irvine, CA 92618 - (949) 753-1099 - Fax (949) 753-1098
http://www.hpiracing.com/pr#16.htm - http://www.hpiracing.com/photos.htm
