By Steve Wittich
Four Road To Indy Presented by Cooper Tires test sessions. Four different drivers and teams top the charts.
This time, Artem Petrov, a Juncos Racing sophomore, turned a lap at 121.467 seconds in his Road To Success/Bell/226ers sponsored No. 42 PM-18, that led the session. Rounding out the top five were two veterans, Parker Thompson (DEForce Racing) and Sting Ray Robb (Juncos Racing), along with a pair of series rookies, Manuel Sulaiman (DEForce Racing) and Braden Eves (Exclusive Autosport).
The second Indy Pro 2000 Championship Presented by Cooper Tires test session got underway at Road America 15-minutes before noon. According to our weather app, the temperature was a steamy 86F.
Robb was the early leader of the session, but at the halfway point, his teammate Petrov had moved to the top of the timing screen with a lap of 121.467 seconds. The rest of the top ten were Robb, Eves, Frost, Thompson, Devlin DeFrancesco (Andretti Steinbrenner Racing), Hunter McElrea (Pabst Racing), Colin Kaminsky (Pabst Racing), Antoine Comeau (Turn 3 Motorsport) and Manuel Sulaiman (DEForce Racing).
Like the USF2000 drivers before them, the times remained stagnant until the final ten minutes of the session. The first drivers to improve their times were Pabst Racing rookies McElrea and Kaminsky. The rest of the field quickly followed.
Several drivers hot laps were thwarted when the red flag came out with just over four minutes remaining. The cause of the red flag was Thompson, who needed help getting extracted from the Turn 6 gravel trap. The clock ran out, and the session was checkered.
The 16 drivers completed 197 circuits of the 4.014-mile, 14-turn natural terrain road course. The Turn 3 Motorsport duo of Frost and Comeau was the busiest drivers, turning 16 laps apiece.
The final Indy Pro 2000 test session will roll off at 2:30 pm (CDT).
Indy Pro 2000 Grand Prix Of Road America Presented By Cooper Tires Honoring First Responders Test #2 Results
RANK | CAR NO. | DRIVER | TEAM | FAST LAP | DIFFERENCE | TOTAL LAPS |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 42 | Artem Petrov | Juncos Racing | 2:01.467 | –.—- | 8 |
2 | 9 | Parker Thompson | DEForce Racing | 2:01.738 | 0.2705 | 11 |
3 | 2 | Sting Ray Robb | Juncos Racing | 2:02.278 | 0.8107 | 6 |
4 | 8 | Manuel Sulaiman | DEForce Racing | 2:02.434 | 0.9662 | 11 |
5 | 1 | Braden Eves | Exclusive Autosport | 2:02.533 | 1.0652 | 15 |
6 | 18 | Hunter McElrea | Pabst Racing | 2:02.649 | 1.1812 | 14 |
7 | 19 | Colin Kaminsky | Pabst Racing | 2:02.670 | 1.2030 | 9 |
8 | 68 | Danial Frost | Turn 3 Motorsport | 2:02.979 | 1.5113 | 16 |
9 | 17 | Devlin DeFrancesco | Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport | 2:03.367 | 1.8997 | 13 |
10 | 3 | Antoine Comeau | Turn 3 Motorsport | 2:03.765 | 2.2972 | 16 |
11 | 36 | Jacob Loomis | BN Racing with Team Benik | 2:04.330 | 2.8629 | 13 |
12 | 37 | Sabre Cook | BN Racing with Team Benik | 2:04.834 | 3.3668 | 14 |
13 | 69 | Nate Aranda | Juncos Racing | 2:05.793 | 4.3252 | 12 |
14 | 57 | Bob Kaminsky | Pabst Racing | 2:05.821 | 4.3541 | 14 |
15 | 6 | Moises de la Vara | DEForce Racing | 2:06.159 | 4.6914 | 11 |
16 | 83 | Charles Finelli | FatBoy Racing | 2:07.096 | 5.6285 | 14 |