Verhagen Wins Race 2 at Road Atlanta
Braselton, GA - After falling back to eighth in the opening portion of the second F1600 race of the day, Neil Verhagen caught the lead group with a series of fast laps and pulled off the win with a last lap move, taking his maiden F1600 Series victory in just his second start. Peter Portante and Steve Bamford completed the podium.
"We got a bad start, but I need to thank K-Hill for all the work, the car was phenomenal," said Verhagen, of his No. 3 Mygale, who tracked down the lead group from more than four seconds behind.
Portante, after winning the earlier race, settled for second and pulls out an early lead in the F1600 Championship standings, although there are 19 races left.
"It was pretty different than the first race," said Portante, who had also tracked down the lead group from four-plus seconds out, and went from fifth to first at one point in the race in 13 corners. "I had to work my way forward. Once I got to the front, I wanted to be second going on the last lap. I set it up on the second to last lap but no one took the bait."
Three hours after winning the F2000 race, Bamford settled for third in F1600, winning the Masters Class.
"It was fun out there," Bamford said. "Everyone was pretty tough but fair. I was leading out of turn 10-b, I had a chance."
Team Pelfrey's Phillippe Denes dominated the early portion of the race and finished fourth in the yellow Team Pelfrey Mygale, just .011 seconds behind Bamford. Teammate Calvin Ming was fifth.
It was also an encouraging run for Exclusive's Trenton Estep, who bounced back from an earlier DNF to finish sixth.
Full results from all sessions are available on www.F1600Series.com, www.F2000Series.com, and www.AtlanticChampionshipSeries.com.