Mallinen, Bamford and Grant Take Wins at Road Atlanta
Braselton, GA – Max Mallinen, Steve Bamford and Keith Grant won in the F1600, F2000 and Atlantic Championship Series races on Sunday at Road Atlanta as part of the Formula Race Promotions season-opening 2016 event weekend.
F1600 Race 3
Ten cars were in a position to win round three of the 2016 F1600 Series on the last lap at Road Atlanta, with Max Mallinen playing race craft to his advantage to take his first career victory to close out the weekend ahead of Steve Bamford and Calvin Ming.
“It’s been an interesting weekend, and I’m happy to end it on top,” said Mallinen, who drives the No. 10 Spectrum for Swan Motorsports. “I ate the wall a bit in qualy on Saturday and had to start last in the first race. Coming into the last lap I was in second and I knew I could pull a draft on the back stretch.”
Bamford made it another Masters Class win and three podiums in F1600 in two days with a second place finish for Rice Race Prep. The Series veteran led in all three F1600 races races.
Team Pelfrey’s Ming didn’t make it easy for Mallinen, as he challenged the No. 10 in turn 12 coming to the checkered flag, but couldn’t make an aggressive move stick, and just barely lost second to Bamford by inches. Of note, Ming charged through the field to finish third after starting last due to a pace lap spin. Air temperature at the race start was just 42 degrees.
“I was trying to get heat in the tires and made a mistake,” noted Ming. “The last lap was crazy, we were four- and five-wide, it was a good race by everyone.”
Trenton Estep finished fourth in his Spectrum from Exclusive Autosport ahead of Neil Verhagen, Saturday’s round two winner from K-Hill Motorsports.
The race’s opening stint was dominated by Phillippe Denes from Team Pelfrey, who was able to pull out a 3.4 second gap after separating from the field on lap three.
Denes looked to be in control of the pace but went off at turn five, which took a strung out lead group and turned it into a pack race for the win. Denes finished sixth ahead of K-Hill’s Hans Ada in seventh.
Ben Auriemma led his first laps of the season and finished eighth, followed by Exclusive Autosport teammate Will Harvey, while Ryan Bjerke completed the top ten.
Mike Scalan and Doug Voss completed the Masters Class podium.
F2000 Race 2
Steve Bamford tracked down David Grant, making his pass for the lead on lap 10 of 21 to sweep the F2000 Series weekend at Road Atlanta with two wins in two days,
opening up an early but sizable Championship lead with 12 races to go. Grant finished second and John McCusker followed in third place.
“It’s a great way to start the season, I can’t complain,” said Bamford, who also led laps and finished on the podium in all three weekend F1600 races.
Grant took the lead on lap one of the race from the second row on the start, holding down the lead for the opening part of the race and finished second, trailing closely behind Bamford.
“The car was pretty good,” Grant said. “We don’t have the straight-away speed to keep up with the Citation, it’s been like that. But the car was on rails and it was good all weekend.”
McCusker, meanwhile, matched his podium performance from Saturday to finish third for Dotworks Racing in the No. 01 Van Diemen, having worked his way past Brandon Dixon mid-race for the final podium spot.
“I struggled a bit today, we made a change and it wasn’t the right direction, but it’s nice to be on the podium,” said McCusker.
Pole-sitter Dixon didn’t get the start he needed, falling back early and never quite recovering, but finishing fourth and adding important points to go with his second place run on Saturday in the No. 5 Citation.
“I didn’t have quite as good a car today, we struggled for grip,” Dixon explained. “The engine cover came loose too and it was flapping around.”
Completing the top five with one of his best F2000 drives to date was Steve Jenks in the No. 68 Van Diemen. Jenks was third in the Masters Class with Bamford taking the Masters Class victory and Dixon second in class.
“This was the first checkered flag we saw all weekend,” said Jenks. “We thrashed to get the car here and made it through.”
Jenna Grillo continued to improve in her debut F2000 weekend for K-Hill Motorsports with a solid drive to a sixth place finish.
Of note, 2015 Champion Sam Beasley led early but he retired after three laps, his second straight DNF in two days in a forgettable Road Atlanta weekend for the F2000 driver.
Atlantic Race 2
From pole, 2015 Atlantic Champion Keith Grant led every lap to win round two of the 2016 Atlantic season Sunday afternoon at Road Atlanta. Grant bounced back from a rare DNF on Saturday to take the victory in the No. 40 Polestar Swift 016/Mazda.
Saturday winner Ryan Norman challenged Grant early but was forced to make an unscheduled visit to the pits and eventually rejoined the race many laps down.
“It was a much better day today,” said Grant, who was able to keep Norman at bay in the early laps of the race. “Had a good car, thanks to Polestar for all the work in getting the car ready.”
The field lined up for a perfect start just after 3:00 p.m. eastern local time, and while Grant led from pole over a challenging Norman, the safety car was dispatched not soon thereafter for an incident involving Kirk Kindsfater, Lee Alexander and Lewis Cooper.
Chris Ash also retired in the early stages of the race, which was run to its 40-minute time window due to the safety car period.
On the restart, Grant was able to hold the lead over an aggressive and challenging Norman, in the No. 48 K-Hill Motorsports Swift 016/Mazda. Norman would stalk Grant lap after lap but fell back from three tenths of a second to one second and then two, before pitting.
Rich Zober, driving for Comprent, inherited second place from Norman and ran there for the majority of the race but pitted with what appeared to be a part failure late in the race.
Kirk Kindsfater, driving for K-Hill Motorsports, was second of the Swift 016s in Atlantic Championship competition in his No. 32 Swift 016/Mazda.
Bob Corliss won the Atlantic Challenge with a last lap pass on Bruce Hamilton. Both drivers were in Swift 014/Toyotas, with Corliss driving for Comprent and Hamilton with K-Hill.
“It was a great race,” said Corliss. “I was caught up in the melee in turn 10 on the first lap and dropped way behind. Comprent gave me a great car.”
Hamilton added: “Corliss finally caught me. I screwed up in turn seven on the last lap and he got in the draft and that was that.”
In a race of attrition, the No. 99 of Johnpaul Ciancimino was also forced to retire on lap 13.
Full results from all three series are available on www.F1600Series.com, www.F2000Series.com, and www.AtlanticChampionshipSeries.com.
Next up is weekend two of seven, scheduled to take place Watkins Glen International, May 13-15.
Photos:
1. Max Mallinen
2. Steve Bamford
3. Keith Grant
On the Web:
F1600: www.F1600Series.com | Facebook | Twitter
F2000: www.F2000Series.com | Facebook | Twitter
Atlantic: www.AtlanticChampionshipSeries.com | Facebook | Twitter
About Formula Race Promotions:
Formula Race Promotions (FRP) operates the F1600, F2000 and Atlantic Championship Series. Starting with F2000 in 2006, FRP added F1600 in 2011 and Atlantic in 2012. The Series’ philosophy is to offer a vertical integration between club and professional racing, while offering some of the best race tracks and significant amounts of track time in single-class running. The 2016 schedule is composed of two winter events and seven-points paying weekends. FRP is privately owned and sanctioned by SCCA Pro Racing.
Sources: Monty Mathisen/MathisenMedia