Optima Batteries will make a splash at the 101st running of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC), with its various battery products powering an array of competitors, in some way or another.
The company will provide Optima Orangetop lithium batteries to several cars, and they’re all pretty amazing in some way. The Rivian R1T is the only standard vehicle, but it takes two of these batteries and will use another Optima product. This electric truck will be charged by a portable Optima Power Station between runs and will be piloted by Gardner Nichols, a Pikes Peak rookie. Nichols has little experience on the treacherous hill climb but has served as a test driver for Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (now part of Stellantis) and currently works as Rivian’s senior performance test engineer.
Now that we’ve talked about the only electric Optima entrant, let’s look at the more exciting builds.
