Postiglione Capitalizes Where It Counts
Fifty-one Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeos lined up at Valencia’s Ricardo Tormo circuit on December 3, 2016, for Race 1 of the fourth annual Lamborghini World Final, the event that pools the top finishers from the European, Asian, and North American continental series into a single season-ending showdown across four classes: PRO, PRO-AM, AM, and Lamborghini Cup. A grid that size, drawn from three continents, already told a story about the health of Lamborghini’s customer racing program. What followed on track only sharpened it.
Vito Postiglione, driving for Imperiale Racing, did not lead from the start. He made his move during the pit-stop window, emerging ahead of the field and holding position to the checkered flag. The Italian finished in front of newly crowned European champion Dennis Lind (Raton Racing) and Italian-American Richard Antinucci (Change Racing). Postiglione’s post-race comments pointed to the team’s three days of intensive preparation and a minor contact with Kodric’s car at the start, itself the result of an incident involving Loris Spinelli.
Spinelli was the hard-luck story of the day. Fastest in both qualifying sessions for Antonelli Motorsport, he led the opening laps before retiring after multiple contacts. Qualifying pace and race-day results rarely align in one-make racing, and Spinelli’s weekend illustrated that reality in painful fashion.
PRO-AM and AM: Breukers, Amstutz, and a MotoGP Star
Eighteen-year-old Rik Breukers (GDL Racing) finished fifth overall and first in PRO-AM, recovering from a qualifying session disrupted by traffic. The PRO-AM podium was completed by Andrea Fontana and Lorenzo Veglia (Antonelli Motorsport) in second and Raffaele Giannoni (Automobile Tricolore) in third.
Andrea Dovizioso, the Ducati MotoGP rider, finished just off the PRO-AM podium. Dovizioso won the second race of the European series finale the previous Friday and remained a consistent presence throughout the weekend, with a ninth-place grid slot for Race 2 the following day keeping him firmly in contention. His participation served a dual purpose for Lamborghini: legitimate competitive credibility for the series and a crossover audience from MotoGP that few single-make championships can attract.
In the AM class, Swiss driver Adrian Amstutz (Bonaldi Motorsport) executed a three-position gain on the opening lap and eventually took the lead from early front-runner Shota Abkhazava (Artline Team Georgia). Amstutz, who celebrated the European PRO-AM title with Patrick Kujala the day before, added a World Final race victory to cap what Lamborghini described as an emotional weekend. Nouri Shahin (Leipert Motorsport) completed the AM podium in second, with Abkhazava slipping to third. The Lamborghini Cup went to American Ross Chouest of DXDT Racing, followed by Gerard Van der Horst and William Van Deyzen, both from the Dutch Van der Horst Motorsport squad.
Why the World Final Format Matters
The World Final operates differently from a typical championship round. Rather than awarding titles through cumulative season points, Lamborghini pools competitors from three continental series into a single weekend at a neutral venue, deciding world honors through dedicated races. The format rewards adaptability: drivers face unfamiliar rivals, different racing styles, and a circuit that may not appear on their regular calendar.
For Lamborghini’s Squadra Corse division, the event functions as both a competitive climax and a brand showcase. The 2016 edition included a Lamborghini Air Show featuring a Zivko Edge 540 in Lamborghini livery, the same aircraft platform used in the Red Bull Air Race World Championship. That kind of spectacle is calculated. It reinforces the idea that buying into the Super Trofeo program delivers more than seat time; it delivers an experience that no rival one-make series replicates at the same scale.
The Super Trofeo pipeline also feeds Lamborghini’s broader motorsport ambitions. Teams like Imperiale Racing, which backed Postiglione in 2016, continued developing talent and infrastructure within the Lamborghini ecosystem for years afterward. Postiglione himself remained with Imperiale Racing for subsequent Super Trofeo Europe campaigns, a continuity that speaks to the program’s ability to retain committed participants rather than cycling through one-season entrants.
What Race 2 Would Decide
Race 1 settled individual race honors, but the world titles depended on the following day’s results. Two fifty-minute races remained on the schedule: AM and Lamborghini Cup at 10:40 a.m., followed by PRO and PRO-AM at 2:00 p.m. Lamborghini offered live streaming through its Squadra Corse portal, a distribution choice that, in 2016, signaled the company’s early commitment to digital audiences rather than relying solely on traditional motorsport broadcast deals.
That 51-car grid confirmed sustained demand for the Huracán Super Trofeo platform at a time when the road-going Huracán was still in the middle of its production lifecycle. The racing program and the showroom product reinforced each other: competitive success on track validated the engineering for prospective buyers, while strong sales funded the motorsport operation. That feedback loop remains central to how Lamborghini positions Squadra Corse today.
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