The Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship was the first INDYCAR sanctioned series to officially kick off their season in preparation for the Cooper Tires Grand Prix of St. Petersburg presented by Andersen RacePark. The sky was a brilliant blue with no clouds and the temperature just cracking 70F.
It was not a surprise two quickest laps of the first USF2000 practice session of the season was led by a pair of veterans. Cape Motorsports’ Darren Keane led the way with a lap of 74.056 seconds. The lap was five-hundredths quicker that track record holder Alexandre Baron.
DEForce Racing rookie Manuel Sulaiman, who is making his first ever start on a street course, ended the session with the third quickest lap.
Rookie Braden Eves (Cape Motorsports) and veteran Colin Kaminsky (Pabst Racing) led a pair of Aussie rookies, Hunter McElrea (Pabst Racing) and Cameron Shields (Newman Wachs Racing).
The first red flag of the session and season came out only five minutes into the lone 30-minute practice session for an incident with Jay Howard Driver Development rookie Matthew Round-Garrido.
At that early part of the session, the top three were Baron, Keane, and McElrea.
The green flag came back out five minutes later and times began to drop as drivers got their Cooper Tire slicks up the correct operating temperature.
The second red flag came out with ten minutes remaining. It was veteran Darren Keane that had the quickest lap at 74.4896 seconds. Baron, MeElrea, Colin Kaminsky and Manuel Sulaiman made up the remainder of the top five.
The track went green again with six minutes remaining and was immediately busy with the buzzing of twenty Elite Engine 2.0 liter power plants.
At the end of the session, 11 of the 19 drivers that turned laps at speed were within one second of Keane’s fast lap.
USF2000 Cooper Tires Grand Prix of St. Petersburg Practice #1 timesheet
RANK | CAR NO. | DRIVER | TEAM | FAST LAP | DIFFERENCE | TOTAL LAPS |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 2 | Darren Keane | Cape Motorsports | 1:14.056 | –.—- | 16 |
2 | 14 | Alex Baron | Legacy Autosport | 1:14.113 | 0.0571 | 16 |
3 | 12 | Manuel Sulaiman | DEForce Racing | 1:14.253 | 0.1967 | 17 |
4 | 8 | Braden Eves | Cape Motorsports | 1:14.363 | 0.3067 | 16 |
5 | 23 | Colin Kaminsky | Pabst Racing | 1:14.378 | 0.3221 | 17 |
6 | 22 | Hunter McElrea | Pabst Racing | 1:14.389 | 0.3328 | 16 |
7 | 73 | Cameron Shields | Newman Wachs Racing | 1:14.711 | 0.6547 | 16 |
8 | 24 | Bruna Tomaselli | Pabst Racing | 1:14.895 | 0.8387 | 17 |
9 | 40 | Jack William Miller | Miller Vinatieri Motorsports | 1:14.976 | 0.9196 | 16 |
10 | 41 | Eduardo Barrichello | Miller Vinatieri Motorsports | 1:15.103 | 1.0466 | 16 |
11 | 27 | Zach Holden | BN Racing | 1:15.138 | 1.0815 | 14 |
12 | 21 | Yuven Sundaramoorthy | Pabst Racing | 1:15.443 | 1.3869 | 16 |
13 | 90 | Manuel Cabrera | Exclusive Autosport | 1:15.552 | 1.4963 | 15 |
14 | 3 | Reece Gold | Cape Motorsports | 1:15.555 | 1.4994 | 14 |
15 | 28 | Anthony Famularo | BN Racing | 1:16.572 | 2.5157 | 15 |
16 | 36 | Nolan Siegel | Newman Wachs Racing | 1:16.741 | 2.6849 | 15 |
17 | 69 | Nate Aranda | Team E JAY Racing | 1:16.781 | 2.7251 | 14 |
18 | 7 | Christian Bogle | Jay Howard Driver Development | 1:17.111 | 3.0550 | 16 |
19 | 77 | Jose Sierra | Legacy Autosport | 1:22.714 | 8.6576 | 2 |
20 | 5 | Matt Round-Garrido | Jay Howard Driver Development | No Time | — | — |
21 | 6 | Christian Rasmussen | Jay Howard Driver Development | No Time | — | — |
The USF2000 series has a twenty-minute qualifying for the Cooper Tires Grand Prix of St. Petersburg rolls off at 4:45 pm.
Parker Thompson, who is on a one event deal with rookie team Abel Motorsports served notice that he left the cold and snow of Red Deer, Alberta, Canada for the warmth of the “Sunshine City,” for one reason. To have fun (and maybe win too).
The 21-year-old’s quick lap at 58.7842 seconds was almost eight-tenths ahead of his next closest competitor, Juncos Racing rookie Rasmus Lindh.
Lindh led a sextet of drivers of drivers covered by a half second that included Lindh, his teammate Sting Ray Robb, Moisés de la Vara (DEForce Racing), Danial Frost (Exclusive Autosport), Kyle Kirkwood (RP Motorsport) and Nikia Lastochkin (Exclusive Autosport).
The second rung of the Road To Indy, the newly renamed Indy Pro 2000 Championship Presented by Cooper Tires, took to the 1.8-mile, 14-turn street circuit 15 minutes after the smaller sibling.
The 14 PM-18 entries quickly got to work on the tricky street circuit with veterans Sting Ray Robb, and Nikia Lastochkin joined by rookies Rasmus Lindh and Kyle Kirkwood at the top of the timing screens.
At the half-way point of the 30-minute session, Thompson went to the top of the timesheet with a lap of 69.320 seconds and was joined in the sub-70 second club by Danial Frost (Exclusive Autosport) and Robb. Veterans Moisés de la Vara and Lastochkin rounded out the top five.
With just under five minutes remaining in the session, Thompson was the first driver to turn a lap under 79-seconds and went quicker than that on his next lap.
Indy Pro 2000 Grand Prix of St. Petersburg Presented by Allied Building Products Practice #1 timesheet
RANK | CAR NO. | DRIVER | TEAM | FAST LAP | DIFFERENCE | TOTAL LAPS |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 8 | Parker Thompson | Abel Motorsports | 1:08.784 | –.—- | 23 |
2 | 10 | Rasmus Lindh | Juncos Racing | 1:09.578 | 0.7941 | 21 |
3 | 2 | Sting Ray Robb | Juncos Racing | 1:09.648 | 0.8637 | 22 |
4 | 6 | Moises de la Vara | DEForce Racing | 1:09.649 | 0.8647 | 23 |
5 | 68 | Danial Frost | Exclusive Autosport | 1:09.756 | 0.9720 | 23 |
6 | 28 | Kyle Kirkwood | RP Motorsport Racing | 1:09.882 | 1.0982 | 19 |
7 | 90 | Nikita Lastochkin | Exclusive Autosport | 1:09.891 | 1.1065 | 23 |
8 | 7 | Kory Enders | DEForce Racing | 1:10.107 | 1.3226 | 22 |
9 | 11 | Antonio Serravalle | Pserra Racing/Jay Howard Driver Development | 1:10.430 | 1.6459 | 22 |
10 | 51 | Jacob Abel | Abel Motorsports | 1:11.070 | 2.2853 | 21 |
11 | 5 | Damiano Fioravanti | RP Motorsport Racing | 1:11.398 | 2.6136 | 20 |
12 | 91 | Parker Locke | Exclusive Autosport | 1:11.866 | 3.0814 | 22 |
13 | 83 | Charles Finelli | FatBoy Racing! | 1:18.365 | 9.5812 | 20 |
14 | 98 | Phillippe Denes | Fatboy Racing! | No Time | — | — |
The Indy Pro 2000 series has a 20-minute qualifying session for the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg Presented by Allied Building Products rolls off at 5:20 pm.