Donoso goes wire-to-wire at Infineon
QUOTES:
PABLO DONOSO (No. 22 TMR-Cristal-Xtreme Coil Drilling, first): “This is great. This is a beautiful day. I’m pretty happy, and I love this track. I won here in 2005 (in Star Mazda), so now I’ve repeated in 2008. I had an awesome car. Team Moore Racing gave me a beautiful car. I did the job. I finished first. But it’s just not me, it’s the team, my family, my manager. This is for all the people who supported me in Chile."
LOGAN GOMEZ (No. 23 IZOD Menards Guthrie Racing, second): “We had something for (Pablo Donoso), it’s just every time you go into a braking zone, all the air is off the cars. And with it being so hot today and a bunch of different rubber on the track, we were just locking up tires. We had a few moments out there, I fell back to Pablo (Donoso), but overall it was a good race. It was a big improvement from where we started at the Open Test, when we were about 11th or 12th. So we’ll take a fifth and a second from a weekend in California."
ANA BEATRIZ (No. 20 Healthy Choice/Sam Schmidt Motorsports, third): “It was a good race. Unfortunately, during the restart I was a little bit stuck behind (Pablo) Donoso. It was so hard to pass, but when someone made a mistake you could pass, and we got another podium. It’s fantastic. I’m really thankful for my Healthy Choice Sam Schmidt crew. They worked really hard this weekend. I don’t know what happened behind us, but I hope we can still fight for the championship."
J.R. HILDEBRAND (No. 25 Allied Building Products, fourth): “It was just tough to pass out there. We were running on a little bit less aero than everyone else. It was helping us stay up, but it was making it so every time I got close I’d kind of lose the front end and wash back off. As you can see, we’ve got guys that were running faster lap times than us yesterday that couldn’t get by, so that’s kind of unfortunate. We could have really stood to finish ahead of Bia (Ana Beatriz) just for the points. But we’re looking pretty good going into Chicago. We’ve had good runs on the big tracks, so I think we should be looking pretty good."
FRANCK PERERA (CJ Consulting Guthrie Racing, fifth): “Yesterday was a good race. It was a good opportunity to pick out the numbers (for the inverted start), but I picked the wrong number. I think the way they do that is not very good. It’s good for all the drivers especially at this track because there’s not much passing, so it’s a very boring race. It was good that (Richard) Antinucci, (Raphael) Matos and myself did some fighting out there. The car was good again, but you cannot overtake here. I just tried to be close to them, and I knew that I could have the opportunity to pass them, and it happened. After that I had just one lap and I was catching them (the race leaders) like crazy. I think I was almost the fastest lap, so I thought we could win again today for sure."
RAPHAEL MATOS (No. 26 Automatic Fire Sprinklers, sixth): “I feel great. That’s what we needed coming out of here. The inversion of the second race made things very, very difficult. I was clearly faster than Richard (Antinucci). Unfortunately, he blocked me four or five times. He didn’t give me any room, and that’s what happened. I’m very happy that I made the pass and continue leading the championship, and we’ll go into Chicago competing for the championship."
RICHARD ANTINUCCI (No. 7 Lucas Oil/Sam Schmidt Motorsports, seventh): “All of the opposition is very difficult this year to pass. Everyone was stationary, and we’re all having control gaps. There was a DNF car in the middle of Turn 8, and he was on line, so we all got a little bunched up. I chose my line from the beginning. In the backstraight, (Raphael) Matos went to the outside and cut the track, so he came out right behind by cutting the track. That’s how he gained the advantage. I chose the inside from the beginning, knowing that he was right on my tail and I would get passed. I can’t bank on having the race review that later on so I defended my position from the inside, and he choose the outside and then back inside and just lifted me in the air and pushed me off. I lost two places. I’m OK, a little bruised but I’m OK"
Results Sunday of the Valley of the Moon 100 Firestone Indy Lights event Aug. 24 at the 2.303-mile Infineon Raceway, with order of finish, starting position in parentheses, driver, laps completed and reason out (if any) and money earned:
1. (1) Pablo Donoso, 30, Running $22,000
2. (4) Logan Gomez, 30, $17,000
3. (3) Ana Beatriz, 30, Running $13,500
4. (5) J.R. Hildebrand, 30, Running $11,500
5. (8) Franck Perera, 30, Running $11,000
6. (7) Raphael Matos, 30, Running $10,500
7. (6) Richard Antinucci, 30, Running $10,000
8. (2) Daniel Herrington, 30, Running $9,500
9. (13) Sean Guthrie, 30, Running $9,250
10. (16) Jonathan Klein, 30, Running $9,000
11. (22) Cyndie Allemann, 30, Running $8,500
12. (15) Juan Manuel Polar, 30, Running $8,000
13. (14) James Davison, 30, Running $7,500
14. (10) Robbie Pecorari, 30, Running $7,000
15. (18) Dillon Battistini, 30, Running $6,500
16. (17) Arie Luyendyk Jr., 30, Running $7,000
17. (21) Tom Dyer, 30, Running $5,750
18. (20) Christina Orr, 30, Running $5,000
19. (9) Jonny Reid, 29, Running $4,500
20. (23) Mark Olson, 28, Running $5,000
21. (19) Brent Sherman, 27, Running $3,000
22. (12) Mike Potekhen, 24, Pits $5,000
23. (11) Mitch Cunningham, 0, Contact $2,000
Race Statistics
Winner's average speed: 89.132 mph
Time of race: 46:30.5168
Margin of victory: 2.0601 seconds
Cautions: 1 caution flag for 3 laps
Lead changes: No lead changes
Lap leaders: Donoso 1-30.
Point standings: Matos 472, Antinucci 469, Beatriz 409,
Hildebrand 401, Battistini 378, Luyendyk Jr. 378, Donoso 343, Gomez 334, Guthrie 309, Davison 303.