RacingNation.com

Mazda Road To Indy Ready To Race At Indy

Speedway, IN – It is qualifying and race day for the Mazda Road to Indy Grand Prix Presented by Royal Purple Supporting Lupus Foundation of America. All three of the Mazda Road to Indy series will qualify and race today at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on the 2.439 mile fourteen turn infield road course.

USF 2000 Race 1 Qualifying
The Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship Powered by Mazda opened activities on Friday morning with qualifying at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for races five and six on the series schedule. Point leader and winner of three of the first four races this season, Oliver Askew immediately jumped to the top of the speed charts. The Cape Motorsports driver from Florida was just under three hundredths of a second quicker than teammate Ricky Donison, who knocked a second off his best lap time in practice and jumped from eleventh on Thursday to qualify second for today’s race. Pabst Racing driver Calvin Ming also picked up the pace from practice and qualified third. Kaylen Frederick, who is currently second in the point standings and was quickest in practice on Thursday, qualified fourth.

Pro Mazda Race 1 Qualifying
Hitting the track for the second event of the season, Brazilian Victor Franzoni led the Pro Mazda Presented by Cooper Tires series in qualifying, capturing the pole with a lap time of 1 minute 23.4608 seconds in the thirty minute session. Series point leader, Australian Anthony Martin will also start in the second row after qualifying third. Martin improved from yesterday’s practice by over a second and showed that he will be a factor in today’s race. Martin won both races at the opening event in St. Petersburg with Franzoni right behind in the runner-up position. Team Pelfrey has always been strong at Indianapolis winning the last three races here and driver TJ Fischer led the team in practice and qualifying. Qualifying second, Fisher will start on the front row with teammates Carlos Cunha behind him and Nikita Lastochkin in row three after qualifying fifth.

Indy Lights Practice
After hitting the track almost 20 minutes late into the practice session, it took just three laps for Kyle Kaiser to place his Juncos Racing ride on the top of the Indy Lights presented by Cooper Tires speed chart. Kaiser is looking to close the points gap between himself and point leader Colton Herta. Herta set the second fastest lap of practice late in session, just a little over two tenths of a second behind Kaiser. Santi Urruita led the Belardi Auto Racing team with the third quickest time overall followed by teammate Shelby Blackstock. Columbian driver Juan Piedrahita was fifth quickest with Kaiser’s teammate, Nico Jamin in sixth. The difference in the field’s best laps was just over a second with Kaiser’s quickest lap of 1:15.1190 to Garth Rickards best lap of 1:16.2432.

Share Button