Nicholas d’Orlando Leads VRD Racing Sweep of Top 3 in USF2000 Practice at Mid-Ohio

By Patrick Stephan

#61 Nicholas d’Orlando, Velocity Racing Development, DB Collaborative/Focused Project Management (Credit: Road to Indy Photo credit: Gavin Baker Photography/Road to Indy)

The Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship took to the track at 8:45am for their lone practice session of the day, with most of the field (perhaps all) out on used tires.

Jace Denmark and Myles Rowe from Pabst Racing were quickest at the halfway mark of the 30 minute session which saw Denmark at 1:23.2244 with his 11th lap.

Lochie Hughes moved to 3rd and then first with about 7 minutes remaining in his Jay Howard #7.  That wouldn’t last though as the timesheet started to shuffle over the final few minutes with Nicholas d’Orlando from Hartsdale, New York going 1:22.6827 to take P1 with a little over 5 minutes remaining in his VRD Racing machine.

Viktor Anderson also with VRD would slot in at P2 for the moment, followed by Nikita Johnson – making it VRD Racing in the top three spots.

With just 2:00 minutes to go, the track went red for Myles Rowe who had gone off in to the gravel trap in Turn 9.  With so little time remaining, the session was checkered, clearly catching many  teams/drivers out as they didn’t get a time to post their quick/late lap.

Rowe’s car was towed back to the pits behind an AMR INDYCAR Safety team truck, with no easily apparent damage, but it also wasn’t running – so we’ll head down to the paddock in a bit to take a look.

Jace Denmark – currently 3rd in the standings with 192 points would finish the session in 8th. Denmark, who turns 18 today, trails Michael d’Orlando (217) and Myles Rowe (211) heading in to this weekend’s triple header.

The Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship will be back on the track at 11:10 for qualifying. They will contest this weekend’s first race at 5:15pm tonight – following the NTT INDYCAR Series first practice session. The other two races of the triple header will run tomorrow at 10:45 and 5:00pm.

With the late caution preventing quick laps for so many competitors, I’m not sure how much stock I put on this timesheet as we head to qualifying – but here is how things finished up: