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[dave carr]

Spider Man 3 was recently released in movie theaters setting all sorts of records for opening week theatrical grosses. Helio Castroneves did his own Spider Man routine climbing the fences after his team won the 31st Checkers/Rallys Pit Stop Challenge setting all sorts of records of their own. Castroneves’ team posted a time of 8.335 seconds to better the 8.888 seconds set by their Penske stable mates from Sam Hornish Jr’s crew.

Team Penske won the Checkers/Rallys Pit Stop Championship for the tenth time (most of any team), their third time in a row, and set the record for quickest pit stop in the history of the competition (7.677 seconds breaking their own record of 7.737 seconds set last year).

Castroneves’ pit crew defeated the Rahal Letterman team of Scott Sharp and Sam Hornish Jr.’s crew defeated Vitor Meira’s Panther Racing team in the semi-finals setting up the all Penske final.

Castroneves was also quickest in the qualification round setting an 8.093 second time to beat out the 8.376 second time posted by Hornish Jr. Scott Dixon’s Target Chip Ganassi crew was the quickest qualifier not wearing Team Penske colors followed by the teams of Dario Franchitti, Dan Wheldon, and Tomas Scheckter.

The Penske team pocketed $65,000 of the $100,000 purse.