Plymouth, Wisc. – Juncos Racing’s Rasmus Lindh picked up his fifth podium and third pole of the 2019 Indy Pro 2000 Championship Presented by Cooper Tires this weekend at Road America.
Lindh earned the pole position for Round 7 and went on to finish second giving him the necessary points to continue to lead the championship.
Juncos Racing looked to carry the strong momentum gained during the month of May to the fourth weekend of the 2019 Indy Pro 2000 Championship on the 4.014 mile, 14-Turn road course. The double header weekend kicked off with one practice session followed by two qualifying sessions.
During the first practice session a mechanical issue caused Lindh (Gothenburg, Sweden) driving the No. 10 Chicago Pneumatic/Juncos Racing car to miss most of the session. Teammate Sting Ray Robb (Payette, Idaho) driving the No. 2 Go Out Local/Big Idaho Potato Truck/Juncos Racing car finished fifth in the session.
Qualifying for the first round of the weekend followed later that day. Robb narrowly missed claiming his first pole and would settle for the second starting position. Lindh qualified fifth.
Juncos Racing carried their strong momentum into the second qualifying run with both drivers battling for the pole position. Lindh went on to claim his third pole of the season and Robb took the second starting position, giving Juncos Racing control of the front row.
The first race of the weekend did not go as planned for Juncos Racing. Robb who started second fell back after the start and would go on to finish seventh. Lindh was able to battle his way through the field up to third, however lost a podium finish on the final lap and would settle for a fourth-place finish.
Juncos Racing controlled the front row for the start of the final race of the weekend. Robb, who started second lost a few positions at the start of the race, while teammate Lindh continued with the lead. The No. 2 Juncos Racing car driven by Robb was able to push forward and move back up to the Top-3, but with only five laps to go was forced to pit. The team discovered the left-rear camber shim had failed, even after extra attention was put into avoiding this potential issue. Robb was able to rejoin the field after the team replaced the camber shim, but would be one lap down and would have to settle for 10th. Lindh went on to post the fastest lap of the race and would finish second, picking up a podium finish to end the weekend at Road America.
Lindh continues to lead the Indy Pro 2000 championship after seven races.
“We started off the weekend qualifying fifth and then going on to take the pole for the second race,” said Lindh. “I am very happy for that, showing we have great speed to get the pole. The first race was a bit tricky. I fell back to seventh, but was able to finish fourth and still had the points lead. During the second race I made a mistake and didn’t close the door enough which ended up putting me in second for the finish. Overall I am very happy with our results and increasing the championship lead. I want to thank Juncos Racing for all of their work and my sponsors for their support.”
Robb currently sits fifth in the championship.
“This weekend started off pretty exciting for us,” said Robb. “We started off the weekend very strong in qualifying. I was 0.06 seconds off of the pole for the first race and only 0.04 seconds off the pole for Race 2. We knew we had the pace going into the races. This weekend is kind of one to forget after the results we received, seventh yesterday and 10th today. Unfortunately, the camber shims came off even after the crew put special attention knowing how hard this track is on this component of the car. We will regroup and look forward to our test at Mid-Ohio this week and will be back strong for the next event at Toronto. I want to thank the team for putting together a strong fast car and my sponsors Go Out Local, Idaho Potato, and OMP for all of their support.”
Team Owner Ricardo Juncos said, “Overall we had a good weekend at Road America. The team worked very hard to give both drivers fast cars, which showed during our qualifying attempts for both races. Rasmus (Lindh) did a great job picking up more valuable points for the championship by earning another pole and podium finish. Sting Ray (Robb) did an excellent job in both qualifying runs, and could have had a podium finish but issues with the camber shim failing took away that chance. This was very unfortunate that he was forced to give up what would have been a solid podium finish after he proved to be one of the fastest cars on track. We will continue to keep our focus and look to carry this momentum into the next rounds next month at Toronto.”