NEWS

As Jerzy Spinkiewicz stood on the top step of the podium in race one at Spa-Francorchamps earlier this year, it was clear that this was a breakthrough moment.

Not since November 2021 with Karol Basz had a Polish driver taken an outright victory in Lamborghini Super Trofeo.

Even more special was the fact that Spinkiewicz achieved his maiden win driving for a Polish team, Uniq Racing, with whom he has raced ever since his karting days.

Taking on the very best at the top of the Pro class with a single-car entry was by no means an easy assignment.

But this was exactly what Uniq Racing managed to do in just its second season in the one-make championship. The #25 Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeo EVO2 was one of the fastest in the 34-car field, regularly taking on the more established teams and fighting for the title for the bulk of the year.

Sadly, for the team and Spinkiewicz, their season came to a premature end. A testing accident prior to the penultimate round of the year injured Spinkiewicz, which will leave him out of action for several months.

The team was formed by Piotr Dabski when his son, and team manager, Karol was racing in go-karts. As the dad-and-lad operation climbed the ranks, so the team expanded.

“I started racing in go-karts when I was eight years old, so quite a long time ago now, and my father was very involved,” says Karol Dabski. “He was my first mechanic, and after some years we decided to start a team because it was quite tough racing just as a small operation.

“The racing scene in Poland then was not so good, we only had a couple of tracks, and I was trying to make my first steps in the sport at that time. But we had a lot of fun, I started doing well and my results were getting better to the point where other drivers were coming to us and asking if they could race with us.

“We started the team in go-karting as a result; the kids would come to our team and race with us; we would help them develop and this is also where Jerzy first started in karting.

“At one point, we had 15 drivers in our team, racing in the European championship, World championship in all the major categories like Rotax, IAM and the official one, OK. We were everywhere, even in Japan.

“We have had a lot of international drivers too, not only Polish drivers. Some have gone all the way to GT3, like [World Endurance Championship LMGT3 race winner] Marino Sato for example. So, we have had quite a lot of drivers which is a nice feeling to have, that we played a role in this.”

Having achieved a lot of success in karting, like most of the motorsport world the team was plunged into uncertainty during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.

Unable to travel and with many karting championships either postponed or cancelled outright, Dabski and his team were at a crossroads. It was at this moment that the move to cars became a realistic possibility.

“Then, the pandemic came, and we had a bit of a problem because we could not leave Poland and that left us without so many options. So, we took the decision to make the move into cars.

“The plan was to start small in Lamborghini because we wanted to focus on Jerzy, and we didn’t know what was going to happen in Super Trofeo.

“We needed to prepare the telemetry, learn the car with the plan to expand to two cars for next season. We were really happy with the first season, a couple of top 10s in Jerzy’s first year. We are learning a lot about the car and the championship, so we have done quite a good job so far.”

Uniq Racing first entered Super Trofeo Europe in 2024, slowly learning the trade and making waves with a series of standout performances from Spinkiewicz. The karting graduate had arrived in the one-make series reserved for the Huracán Super Trofeo EVO2 off the back of success in the Renault Clio Cup and turned heads with an impressive weekend in Barcelona, the penultimate round of the season.

Until his season-ending accident, Spinkiewicz was impressing on and off the track as well. Selected to be part of the Lamborghini Super Trofeo Junior Driver programme for the second successive year at the start of 2025, he currently lies fifth in the Pro standings with three podiums.

For Dabski, Spinkiewicz’s rise comes as no surprise, having guided the 19-year-old since his early days in go-karting.

“I have always been there with Jerzy, because when I finished my racing career, I became his driver coach,” Dabski explains. “I always coached when I was still racing, focusing on the telemetry and data, so now I have been helping Jerzy for around 10 years.

“He has been a big part of the team and he has improved so much even in less than a year [in Super Trofeo]. When he got his first win, I was so nervous. I was telling him to slow down, slow down but he was so comfortable.

“And the first win, it didn’t come from nowhere, he was working a lot for this, and he put in a lot of effort. He is always happy to try something new and learn by doing. Even if we say to him, ‘maybe we can do this or do that’ he will try it.

“Jerzy is also very consistent in his driving, and strong at overtaking too. I am sure he will have a bright future.”

Running a one-car team has its benefits, but also its pitfalls. While the team can focus all of its efforts around its driver, Uniq Racing is also limited to what data it can share when it comes to working with different setups.

It means that the success on-track was even more impressive.

“We have been successful, but we have also had to learn a lot from our defeats and when things don’t go so well,” reflects Dabski. “And a lot of hard work too, when we were building our team, we just had a small premises but over the years, we are expanding and developing more.

“Some teams are building thanks to sponsorship; us is it the opposite. We do it through hard work and investment, from karting all the way to Super Trofeo. It’s so much work, that even we are away from our family a lot of the time, but we are passionate.

“My dad [Piotr] is the owner; I am the general manager, and my brother [Szymon] takes care of the Lamborghini. He used to be a mechanic in the karting team, but now he is taking care of everything to do with the Super Trofeo. Stripping down the engine, cleaning everything, reassembling the car; everyone in the team has several jobs.”

Although Spinkiewicz will miss the remaining four races of the 2025 season and the World Finals, the Polish driver is aiming to make his return to racing before long. Dabski says the team and driver will be back stronger than ever. Based on their 2025 campaign, you wouldn’t expect anything less.