Bortolotti: Engstler, Pepper Win ‘Keeps Us Together Forever’

Photo: SRO/JEP

Lamborghini factory driver Mirko Bortolotti says his victory alongside Luca Engstler and Jordan Pepper in last year’s CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa will “keep us together forever” despite them all driving different cars in this weekend’s race.

The trio won at the wheel of a GRT Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 last year on the car’s farewell factory-backed appearance in the Belgian endurance classic.

While Bortolotti remains with GRT with the new-for-2026 Lamborghini Temerario GT3, Engstler is now piloting Rutronik Racing’s example and Pepper has departed to become a factory BMW driver.

“There is that special historical moment that will be something that will keep us together and it will be something that all three of us are happy to have as part of our achievements and journey,” Bortolotti told Sportscar365 of last year’s “very emotional” win.

“But now we’re here as opponents and we’re all professionals and everybody will push for his own team and his own car and this is the way it should be.”

Engstler, meanwhile, says he feels “relief” at arriving at this year’s 24H Spa as an event winner.

“I always felt quite a bit of pressure coming to Spa because it was a race I really wanted to win,” he told Sportscar365. “This year I came with the mindset of just trying to enjoy the best job in the world.”

Both Bortolotti and Engstler admit a repeat victory is incredibly unlikely with the Temerario GT3 still early in its development and will line up in 20th and 32nd places respectively.

Bortolotti believes he achieved the “absolute maximum” from the car in the Superpole shoot-out and this left him with mixed emotions.

“Super happy, fully nailed the lap — there was simply nothing left on the table,” he said. “But, on the other hand, not happy to be P20 with a perfect lap, it just shows us there’s a lot of work ahead of us still.

“We’re not here approaching this as a practice session, we want to compete, we want to win.

“Definitely we will not play a role in terms of performance for the win, we need to be realistic on that.

“But good race execution, stay out of trouble, have a clean race – this is the main target for us. We need to be prepared in case something like this [crazy weather] happens and try to grab the opportunity.”

Engstler added that the previous GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS round at Monza, when he finished seventh alongside Marco Mapelli and Patric Niederhauser “after starting from nowhere” shows how fortunes can turn around.

“In the end it’s a matter of not doing any mistakes,” he said. “We need to make sure the car is running for 24 hours.

“It’s a similar approach to when you fight for victory, you just try to do your job as good as possible and we’re still in for a good result.”

Engstler added there is still so much to learn with the new machine as Lamborghini starts from scratch at every circuit it visits when competing against rivals with vastly more experience and data of their cars.

“With the Huracan we knew exactly what we were doing — I think coming here last year we didn’t do a single setup adjustment because the car and team was so great,” he said. “Now we’re throwing darts, trying to learn, trying to understand.”

Source: Sports Car 365