Minor Dominates Watkins Glen Weekend
Watkins Glen, NY – Tim Minor made it a clean sweep of the Watkins Glen International F2000 weekend with two wins in rounds three and four of the 2014 season. The defending Series Champion briefly lost the lead on the start, but still managed to lead flag-to-flag at the Glen for his third win at the track. The race ended under caution with Minor on the top step of the podium and Kevin Kopp and Sergio Pasian completing the top three.
“It was an interesting start and restart today. They were a bit hairy. I need to thank Eric Langbein and my crew chief Tim Reedy, everyone wants to give me credit but this is a team sport,” said a humble Minor, who makes it three wins and a second place finish in four starts this season. He extends his growing points lead for Ski Motorsports heading into VIR in June. The No. 88 of Minor has picked up additional sponsorship recently from The Bungalow Lakehouse in Sterling, Virginia.
Kopp meanwhile adds another second place result for the No. 66 Kopp Motorsports Van Diemen while Sergio Pasian makes another trip to the podium in his No. 23 Van Diemen.
Said Kopp: “I had a great restart and tried to use Minor as a rabbit, and forget about my mirrors.”
Dean Baker and Steve Bamford, coming off a notable incident in Saturday’s F1600 race, completed the top five in another pair of Van Diemen chassis.
Of the top five, Canadian drivers took over, with Pasian, Baker and Bamford all hailing from Canada.
David Grant was sixth for Polestar in the highest-placing of the two Spectrum chassis while John McCusker continued a good season in the Dotworks Racing RFR with a seventh place effort. Chris Livengood was in eighth while Al Guibord drove from 23rd on the grid to a ninth place finish with Tom Fatur was right behind him in tenth.
Also impressive was Sam Beasley, who was forced to start dead last in 33rd with a grid issue in his No. 44’s clutch. The Polestar team was able to get Beasley push started just in time for him not to go a lap down as Beasley caught the field thanks to an early full course caution before moving through the large pack, advancing some 19 positions.
Saturday’s second-place finisher Skylar Robinson was forced to start last following a throttle spring issue in qualifying. The 18-year-old, who will graduate high school next weekend, retired on lap one with suspension damage due to an incident on the front straight at the race start.
Tim Paul retired with car problems while running third and Thomas McGregor suffered a flat tire, ending his day on lap six. McGregor had put together two straight third-place runs for his Exclusive Autosport No. 93 Spectrum. McGregor even briefly led after forcing his way by Minor at the start of the race.
More retirements included Joey Selmants, who drove back to the paddock after the second lap with reported damage. There was also Donald Betterly, who went off on the opening lap. In addition Jim Libecco stopped on track, retiring his No. 98 Van Diemen on the third lap of the race.
The F2000 Series season continues June 6-8 at VIRginia International Raceway, rounds five and six of 14, stay tuned to the latest on www.F2000Series.com.
Race Results:
PosNo.NameLapsBest TmMake/ModelDiff 1 88 Tim Minor/M 12 1:54.334 Citation F2k - 2 66 Kevin Kopp 12 1:55.348 Van Diemen +1.411 3 23 Sergio Pasian 12 1:53.776 Van Diemen Rf +3.438 4 52 Dean Baker/M 12 1:55.483 Van Diemen Rf05 +4.682 5 07 Steve Bamford/M 12 1:55.820 Van Diemen Rf08 +8.006 6 29 David Grant 12 1:55.449 Spectrum 014Z +9.491 7 01 John McCusker 12 1:55.352 Rfr 12 +11.399 8 73 Chris Livengood 12 1:55.561 Rfr +12.333 9 95 Alan Guibord 12 1:55.322 Radon +15.577 10 70 Tom Fatur/M 12 1:55.775 Van Diemen +16.443 11 14 Jason Rabe 12 1:56.547 Van Diemen +18.083 12 35 Eric Presbrey/M 12 1:56.997 Van Diemen +20.225 13 19 Doug Stout/M 12 1:56.643 Van Diemen Rf05 +21.551 14 44 Sam Beasley 12 1:54.802 Van Diemen +22.811 15 83 Charles Finelli/M 12 1:56.523 Van Diemen RF01 +23.572 16 37 Davy D'addario 12 1:56.582 Rfr +25.649 17 90 Robert Wright/M 12 1:56.756 Radon Rn10 +25.651 18 31 Brendan Puderbach 12 1:58.506 Rfr +25.652 19 76 Beau Borders 12 1:59.616 Van Diemen Rf-01 +30.339 20 12 Bob Reid/M 12 1:59.714 Rfr +32.732 21 61 Tom Drake/M 12 1:59.369 Van Diemen Rf99 +34.339 22 16 Peter Gonzalez/M 12 2:01.041 Radon Rn 10 +37.245 23 57 Steven Dweck 12 2:03.925 Van Diemen Rf01 +40.026 24 08 Hilton Tallman/M 12 2:03.810 Mygale 01 +41.559 25 26 Alain Matrat 12 2:08.748 Van Diemen Rf99 +43.673 26 97 Christopher Gumprecht 7 1:59.477 Rfr 5 Laps 27 06 Timothy Paul 6 1:59.957 Van Diemen 6 Laps DNF 93 Thomas McGregor 5 1:57.153 Spectrum 014Z 7 Laps DNF 1 Quinlan Lall 5 1:58.913 Radon Rn10 +8:12.802 DNF 98 James Libecco 2 1:58.618 Van Diemen Rf05 10 Laps DNF 28 Joey Selmants 1 2:02.446 Van Dieman Rf00 11 Laps DNF 80 Donald Betterly 0 -.--- Van Diemen 12 Laps DNF 6 Skylar Robinson 0 -.--- Citation +0.500