McElrea third overall in US Indy Pro Series

Kiwi Hunter McElrea has held on to third overall in the 2021 Indy Pro 2000 Series after a wet and tricky final round, the VP Racing Lubricants Grand Prix of Mid-Ohio Presented by Cooper Tires. Christian Rasmussen from Copenhagen, Denmark, needed only to start the final race of the season for the Jay Howard Driver Development team to add the Indy Pro 2000 championship to the USF2000 title he won in 2020. Rasmussen did much more than that, fighting through from the back to edge Russian Artem Petrov (Exclusive Autosport) for third place by just over two hundredths of a second at the line.

McElrea started an eventful day by comfortably eclipsing the field in a wet qualifying session for Pabst Racing to claim his fifth Cooper Tires Pole Award of the season. McElrea earlier qualified in tenth for the opening race, finishing in seventh. He went on to finish sixth in the final 18th race of the season.

Hunter McElrea made it five pole positions for the season

The track remained extremely damp at the start of the final 25-lap race but the rain had stopped so it wasn’t long before a drier line began to emerge. After one additional lap behind the Pace Car for the drivers to gain a better understanding of the conditions, McElrea took off into the lead as Petrov immediately jumped ahead of Ahmed for second. The Russian continued his early charge by diving past McElrea on the downhill straightaway leading toward Turn Four, only to carry too much speed into the corner and run off wide into the gravel. A little farther back, debutant Jordan Missig (Pabst Racing), from Channahon, Ill., also made a mistake to bring out a full-course caution.

McElrea again led at the restart, but this time came under instant attack from Petrov’s teammate, Braden Eves, from New Albany, Ohio, who again went for a pass in Turn Four. Unlike Petrov, Eves was able to make the move stick. Eves pulled out a lead of almost five seconds before another brief rain shower led him to skate off the track in Turn Two. Eves was fortunate to be able to resume in second, behind Ahmed, but at almost the same time, Missing, who had elected to change onto slick tires, also slid off into the gravel at the same turn. Cue another full-course caution.

Ahmed became the third different leader at the restart but soon came under increasing pressure from the flying Roe. The Irishman had overtaken Eves with a bold outside-line pass in Turn Four on Lap 12, then next time around repeated the maneuver on Ahmed, a former British F3 Champion.

Roe eked out a lead of over three seconds before one final caution period on Lap 19 erased the gap entirely and brought the chasing pack back together again for a four-lap dash to the checkers.

Now on a rapidly drying track, Roe managed his pace to perfection, holding off Ahmed by a scant 0.1412 of a second at the finish line. Just behind, Rasmussen barely sneaked ahead of Petrov in an intense battle for third.

Peter Dempsey hoisted a second PFC Award of the day as the winning car owner, while Rasmussen added to his championship title by claiming the Tilton Hard Charger Award.

Farther back in ninth, Jacob Abel, from Louisville, Ky., rewarded his family-run Abel Motorsports team with The Ticket Clinic Fastest Lap Award after making the switch to dry-weather slick tires during the final caution period. Two or three more laps and he could well have been challenging for the win.

It was an exciting way to finish another excellent season of racing for the Road to Indy, which this evening will crown all its champions – and distribute more than $3.1 million in scholarships and awards – at the traditional end of season celebration.

Provisional championship points after 18 of 18 rounds:
1/ Christian Rasmussen, 445
2/ Braden Eves, 407
3/ Hunter McElrea, 378
4/ Artem Petrov, 374
5/ Reece Gold, 366
6/ Jacob Abel, 287
7/ James Roe, 243
8/ Kyffin Simpson, 231
9/ Manuel Sulaiman, 214
10/ Wyatt Brichacek, 214

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