Inge Takes Pole as Records Drop
Watkins Glen, NY – American Matthew Inge lowered the track record at Watkins Glen further en route to taking pole position for tomorrow’s F2000 race. Inge set a quick lap of 1:53.015 early in the session that only Chris Miller could come close to, but he’ll have to settle for second with a lap of 1:53.168. Miller was stuck in slower traffic for much of the session.
"The session was really good," commented Inge, who earns his first career pole and three championship points. "I learned from my mistakes yesterday and St. Clair gave me a great car so I was able to just put my head down and go for the pole."
Inge won his first F2000 race a few weeks ago at Mosport and was running in the top three yesterday until an incident with Remy Audette cost him his front wing on the back straight. Once St. Clair repaired the car Inge was laps down and out of contention, costing him valuable championship points in what appears to be a three-man fight for the title between him, Chris Miller and Remy Audette.
Remy Audette will line up third. "The car is really good but I need to fix my driving a bit," Audette said.
Jonathan Scarallo bounced back from a crash in yesterday’s race to qualify fourth, his best result of the season. Scarallo said: "I was on the limit for my lap, every corner, it was on the brink of crashing almost. I have to thank my crew as they were up all night fixing both Group A cars and did a great job." Scarallo’s car sports a new black paintjob for this weekend along with aero tweaks developed in house by Group A Racing.
Al Guibord, Jr. rounded out the top five, riding momentum from his fourth place finish in the first race of the weekend yesterday afternoon.
Phil Lombardi, Chris Gumprecht, Matt McDonough, Benjamin Searcy and Masters Class points leader Tom Fatur rounded out the top ten.
"I qualified sixth yesterday so it’s all about consistency," said Lombardi, who finished second in yesterday’s race. “You can win from the first three rows very easily so hopefully we can build upon our second place from the first race.”
Fatur commented: "The tailwind down the back stretch helped our top speed and the grip left from the Indy Car rubber was unbelievable, the track was so much faster today."
Dwight Rider and Ardie Greenamyer made contact about halfway through the session to bring out the black flag for a few minutes. With cleanup completed, the session resumed with just four minutes to go which was not enough time for anyone to get their tires up to temperature to threaten the top ten.
Fabio Orsolon will line up near the back of the field as electrical problems prevented him from completing any laps during qualifying. Group A Racing was not able to repair Colin Alexander's car in time for the qualifying session after a heavy impact in yesterday's race.
Tomorrow’s 14 lap/30 minute race gets underway around 11:00, live updates on www.F2000ChampionshipSeries.com
Qualifying Results:
PosNo.NameBest TmBest SpdIn LapDiffGap102Matthew Inge1:53.015107.3493--285Chris Miller1:53.168107.2036+0.153+0.153321Remy Audette1:54.051106.3733+1.036+0.883422Jonathon Scarallo1:54.061106.3645+1.046+0.010595Al Guibord, Jr.1:54.153106.2783+1.138+0.09263Phil Lombardi1:54.282106.1585+1.267+0.129797Chris Gumprecht1:54.410106.0405+1.395+0.128811Matt McDonough1:54.498105.9586+1.483+0.088910Benjamin Searcy1:54.778105.7002+1.763+0.2801070Tom Fatur/M1:54.800105.6792+1.785+0.0221127Craig Clawson/M1:55.211105.3025+2.196+0.411128Mark Defer/M1:55.253105.2646+2.238+0.0421320Caitlin Johnston1:55.343105.1822+2.328+0.0901489Rob Nicholas1:55.469105.0675+2.454+0.1261580Bobby Caldwell1:55.518105.0235+2.503+0.0491656Mike Mazziotti/M1:55.561104.9849+2.546+0.0431790Robert Wright/M1:55.619104.9319+2.604+0.058185Keith McCrone/M1:55.807104.7615+2.792+0.188194Chris Camadella/M1:55.828104.7425+2.813+0.0212096Alejandro Munoz1:55.965104.6184+2.950+0.1372183Charles Finelli/M1:56.155104.4478+3.140+0.1902260Dwight Rider/M1:56.490104.1464+3.475+0.3352325Jeff McCusker/M1:56.562104.0825+3.547+0.0722428Ardie Greenamyer1:56.952103.7355+3.937+0.390257Brent Gilkes/M1:57.465103.2828+4.450+0.5132694Blake Teeter1:58.235102.6098+5.220+0.6132747Scott Gesford1:58.940102.0014+5.925+0.7052817Tyler Hunter1:57.622103.1444+4.607+0.1572951Dan Denison/M1:59.900101.1844+6.885+0.9603015Mark Felsen2:00.715100.5018+7.700+0.8153126Fabio Orsolon-.----0--3208John Dole/M-.----0--3312Colin Alexander-.----0--