Junior Open Wheel Talent

Richard Kent will return to Star Mazda competition for a minimum of two races this season.  The 21-year-old British driver will join Team GDT at both St. Petersburg and Sebring International Raceway and remains hopeful that he will be able to secure the ride full-time.

Kent tested with the team at Sebring International Raceway in January as part of the pre-season official test.  Since that time he has also sampled an Indy Lights car at Barber Motorsports Park with Genoa Racing.

Carlos Conde, who also tested with Team GDT in January, will compete in the Star Mazda Masters class in 2010 for GDT.  J.W. Roberts, who owns Team GDT, will return to the cockpit again this season and plans to compete in all the road and street course events via the Expert class.

The team is currently working to try and help secure additional funding which would allow for Richard Kent to complete the full 2010 Star Mazda season.  In 2009, Kent finished the year with 4 pole positions, 4 podiums and 2 victories en route to a 7th place finish in the overall championship.

Canadian David Ostella is set to return for his sophomore season in the Star Mazda ranks.  He re-signed with AIM Autosport this week after completing a successful test with the team in January.  His teammate this season will be Michael Furfari, who signed with AIM in early January.

Last season, while competing in Star Mazda, Ostella had 6 top-ten finishes including a best finish of 3rd which occurred at Iowa Speedway.  Last season was a learning/development year for Ostella who had previously competed in the Formula BMW-Americas series.  Expect to see a more consistent driver in 2010.

Chris Miller, who won the 2009 F2000 Championship, has registered to compete in both the USF2000 and Star Mazda events during the weekend stop in St. Petersburg, Florida.  He will be driving a JDC Motorsports entry in both series.

For now, the USF2000 race is strictly a one-off opportunity, but it’s possible we will see him back in the car later this season.  His main focus for 2010 will be the Star Mazda Championship.

The JDC Motorsports squad is yet to officially announce their drivers for the 2010 USF2000 National Championship, but the team plans to field 3-4 cars in the series this year.  Rumored drivers, at this point, are Brazilian Raphael Abbate and Colombian Martin Sala.  Stay tuned for a future announcement or official confirmation.

Hayden Duerson

Hayden Duerson has signed a two-race contract with Juncos Racing for the opening events of the 2010 Star Mazda championship.  Both events—Sebring & St. Petersburg— will be held in his home state of Florida.

The 18-year-old St. Petersburg native is excited to be competing in front of friends and family.

“I am looking forward to working with my teammates, Conor Daly and Tatiana Calderon, and I believe with the help of Ricardo and the great team of people he has put together, we will be very competitive this year,” Hayden stated in a release.  “It will especially be a lot of fun for me to race in front of my family and friends when we compete in the Honda Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, a race I have wanted to be a part of for a long time.”

I followed Hayden pretty closely in the karting ranks and he always impressed me.  He produced solid results in both the Skip Barber Regional and National programs as well.  The jump to Star Mazda will be a big one, but one I’m sure he’s capable of making with relative ease.

I’m hopeful that he will be able to secure adequate funding and run more than just two events this season with Juncos Racing.

Conor Daly has signed with Juncos Racing for the 2010 Star Mazda Championship.

The partnership was all but set-in-stone after the duo had a very successful pre-season test at Sebring International Raceway in late-January.  Conor topped the time charts in 3 out of the 6 sessions and set the fastest lap of the weekend with a 2:00.588.  It was just a matter of finalizing some sponsors before the official announcement could be made.  Last season, Conor drove for Andersen Racing in the Star Mazda championship and finished 3rd in the overall standings.  He completed the year with 1 win, 1 pole position, 6 podiums and 9 top-five finishes.  His most impressive drive of the year was perhaps his first race in a Star Mazda car (Sebring), where he drove from 16th on the grid to finish 3rd.

Conor is, without a doubt, a very promising open-wheel prospect and now that he is returning for a second year in Star Mazda competition he will be a favorite to challenge for the overall title.  It’s nice to see him stick around for an additional year of development rather than rush up the ladder like so many seem to do.  I have a feeling that he won’t be disappointed in that decision come October.

Tristan Vautier has signed with Andersen Racing for the 2010 Star Mazda Championship.  The 20-year-old Frenchman tested with the team at Sebring International Raceway last month during the first official test of the 2010 season.  He even made my “What Was Good” list following the test.

He will be a nice addition to the already potent lineup assembled by Andersen Racing.  The current roster includes Vautier, Anders Krohn and Mikael Grenier.  Dom Bastien will run a partial season for the Florida-based team.

Last season, Vautier competed in the Formula Palmer Audi series where he finished 4th in the final standings.  During his campaign, he won 6 races and stood on the podium 9 times.   Away from FPA competition, he ran two events in both the Formula Renault 2.0 Eurocup and the FIA Formula Two Championship.  He stood on the podium in his very first Formula Two outing at Cataluyna.

It was announced this morning that the 2010 Star Mazda champion will receive a Indy Lights test.  The prize will also be put into place for last year’s champ Adam Christodoulou.  Christodoulou will likely complete the test later this month.

Adam, 20, previously tested a Indy Lights car with Bryan Herta Autosport at Mid-Ohio.  He was also scheduled to take part in the “champions test” —along with Alexander Rossi— courtesy of Sam Schmidt Motorsports.

More recently he spent a few days testing an Atlantic Championship car with Team Stargate Worlds.  Stay tuned for an official update on his 2010 plans.

Linares Racing is set to become the first Venezuelan team to enter the Star Mazda Championship.

Linares Racing

The team took delivery of their first car today and are planning to expand to a two-car team later this season.  The team is owned by Gustavo Linares who ran three Star Mazda events in 2009 and tested with JDC Motorsports at both Sebring International Raceway and Iowa Speedway.  Gustavo hopes to get behind the wheel later this season as the teams second driver.

Gustavo’s younger brother Carlos Linares plans to run the full 2010 Star Mazda schedule for the family-run team.  Carlos tested with Andersen Racing last year at Road Atlanta in addition to running a few Skip Barber National events.  While at home in Venezuela he competed in the Formula Ford 1600 championship earning the overall title by claiming 2 wins and 3 podiums.

I expect there will be a rather large learning curve for Carlos this season but the team has made some impressive connections and will likely improve every time they hit the track.  Their first test is scheduled for March 3rd, 2010 at Sebring.

Caio Lara

Brazilian driver Caio Lara has re-signed with JDC Motorsports for the 2010 Star Mazda Championship following the test last weekend at Sebring International Raceway.

It will be nice to see Lara return for another season of Star Mazda competition.  He made some big improvements in 2009, especially during the first-half of the season.  It will be interesting to see what he can do this year—his third year in Star Mazda and second year with JDC Motorsports.  His best finish last year was fourth, which occurred at both Sebring International Raceway and New Jersey Motorsports Park.  The 19-year-old Sao Paulo native finished 8th in the final standings for 2009.

The Star Mazda Championship just completed their first official test of the 2010 season over the weekend at Sebring International Raceway.  The winter test is great because it gives us a chance to see where people stack up and what kind of field we can expect in the season to come.  All things considered, I’d say Star Mazda had a real solid outing and it’s likely they will add quite a few cars/drivers to the mix for the season opener in March.

I’ve decided to bullet a few thoughts on the test. Feel free to add your own thoughts via the comment section.

What Was Good

• -Conor Daly- Daly topped 3 out of the 6 sessions and set the fastest overall lap of the weekend.
• -Connor McCombs- Okay, so this Connor wasn’t racing but Eric McCombs (Star Mazda Webmaster) and his wife welcomed their second son.  Congratulations!
• -Anders Krohn- Anders Krohn started off the year right where most people expected him (at the front).  He only finished outside the top-three in one session.
• -Tristan Vautier- Tristan Vautier really impressed me.  This weekend marked his first time in a Star Mazda car… yet, he consistently ran at the front posting some solid lap times.
• Rusty Mitchell- Mitchell ran into a few issues over the weekend but overall he posted some very respectable times and spent most of the weekend near the front—- driving the family-owned #66 car.

What Wasn’t So Good

• The Minnesota Vikings… oh wait, that’s a different story.  Turnovers aside, the officiating was pretty horrific as well.
• Weather -Reportedly there was a pretty big tail wind that was catching drivers yesterday and causing some issues.  A few rain showers hit the track surface on-and-off as well.  Although, a little rain testing isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
• Speed- Without naming anyone specific there were a few drivers who were considerably off the pace and personally, I expected quite a bit more from them.  That said, it’s important to note that everyone comes up to speed at a different pace and the first race is still about two-months away.
• Atmosphere – By all reports, the overall feel of the test was a bit strange without the Atlantic Championship and the ALMS in attendance.

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Full Test Results