Podium for Tagliani in kart outing.

Conquest Racing driver Alex Tagliani took a podium finish alongside sportscar racer Joey Hand and Gatorz sunglasses owner Kerry Lynch in an end of season endurance karting event held at the Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

From the start, Team Gatorz showed their competitiveness, qualifying second before Tagliani was charged with starting the seven-hour race.

By the time he ended his stint, Tagliani had gained a 30-second advantage on the field and Hand then increased Team Gatorz' lead to about 40 seconds before encountering problems with the accelerator. The team lost time having to change karts and returned to the track two laps behind the leaders with around three hours left.

Despite the troubles they faced, the duo continued to soldier on. When Hand completed his turn aboard the kart he had made up one and a half laps. Tagliani then took over the driving duties for the final stint of the 500-lap race. The French-Canadian not only made his way back on the lead lap, he also lapped the field to gain a one-lap advantage on everyone.

With the race winding down, it looked like Tagliani had control of the lead and was heading for victory before he ran out of fuel with less than 20 minutes left in the race.

Tagliani didn't give up and pushed his kart back to the pits where he was able to refuel and resume - taking the flag in third place.

"Karting is something I always held dear to my heart and that I enjoy doing to keep myself in good racing condition during the off-season," he admitted. "When Kerry Lynch, the owner of Gatorz sunglasses, one of my personal sponsors, asked me if I wanted to do this, I immediately accepted. I had a blast, it was a lot of fun.

"It was a little crazy at the end when I started pushing the kart back to the pits. When I went back out I had no clue what position we were in but I just kept on pushing and pushing. I was really happy when I crossed the finish line in third, I didn't think we had made it that far up."