Indy NXT

IPS: Mid-Ohio: Series race report

ANTINUCCI CLAIMS FIRST CAREER WIN LEXINGTON, Ohio, Sunday, July 22, 2007 -- Rookie Richard Antinucci claimed his first win in the Indy Pro Series, holding off Wade Cunningham to win the Mid-Ohio 100. Antinucci, the nephew of 1998 Indianapolis ...

Edited: Mar 27, 2008, 11:54 PM

Copy link

Share on Viber

Add as a preferred source

ANTINUCCI CLAIMS FIRST CAREER WIN

LEXINGTON, Ohio, Sunday, July 22, 2007 -- Rookie Richard Antinucci claimed his first win in the Indy Pro Series, holding off Wade Cunningham to win the Mid-Ohio 100.

Antinucci, the nephew of 1998 Indianapolis 500 winner Eddie Cheever Jr., started fourth and moved behind race leader Alex Lloyd on Lap 6 of 40. On Lap 15, Antinucci was 0.4064 of a second behind Lloyd's No. 7 Lucas Oil/Isilon Systems/Sam Schmidt Motorsports car. On the next lap, he passed the series points leader in Turn 4 of the 2.558-mile, 13-turn circuit.

On a Lap 23 restart, Lloyd's car was eliminated when he lost drive to the wheels and guided the car off the course. Cunningham inherited second and a battle ensued between series rookie and the 2005 series champion.

MID-OHIO 100 POST-RACE NOTES:

* This is Richard Antinucci's first Indy Pro Series victory. His previous best finish was fifth at Watkins Glen #2 earlier this month.

* This is Cheever Racing's first Indy Pro Series victory. It joins Panther Racing, Andretti Green Racing and A.J. Foyt Racing as teams with wins in the IndyCar Series and Indy Pro Series.

* Wade Cunningham finished second, his fifth consecutive top-five finish.

* Stephen Simpson finished third, the best finish of his Indy Pro Series career. His previous was fourth at St. Petersburg #1 earlier this year.

MID-OHIO 100 POST-RACE QUICK QUOTES:

RICHARD ANTINUCCI (No. 51 Cheever Racing, winner Mid-Ohio 100): "We were very progressive, getting faster and faster. I was worried after the restart. We struggled a bit compared to (Wade) Cunningham. I think he had higher tire pressures, which allowed him to be set up quicker. But we were there all weekend, and we finally won one."

WADE CUNNINGHAM (No. 27 Automatic Fire Sprinklers, finished second): "It was tough. We opted to go for a light downforce setup, and it was great for passing. But the car definitely was difficult to drive over the long run. Richard (Antinucci) was running more downforce than us. We were much quicker down the straight. We had to take that gamble starting sixth, and it got us a second so I'm pleased with that."

STEPHEN SIMPSON (No. 24 Kenn Hardley Racing, finished third): "We were probably two- or three-tenths off Wade (Cunningham) and Richard (Antinucci), so there's a little more work to do. But all in all it was a strong weekend for the Kenn Hardley Racing crew."

ANDREW PRENDEVILLE (No. 5 RLR/Andersen Racing, finished fourth): "It was a great weekend. Our best yet. I don't think I had any contact with anyone. It was close with [Bobby] Wilson. I'll have to ask him if we touched, but I don't think so. We raced hard, but we've done that so many times before. They were gaining 10 car lengths on the straights, and I could pull nine to 11 car lengths on them in the twisty stuff to keep in front of them. The only way that was possible was because we had a really good-handling car. The start was not the greatest. (Wade) Cunningham blew right by me. That was just a case of better straight-line speed. But I was able to make up a lot of the distance, and I almost got the position back a little later. We finished all 40 laps for the Best Friends Animal Society. We had our best qualifying result yet, and we duplicated our best race result. It was a great weekend."

-credit: irl

We want your opinion!

What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?

Take our 5 minute survey.

- The Motorsport.com Team

Read and post comments

Share Or Save This Story

Copy link

Share on Viber

Previous article IPS: Mid-Ohio: RLR/Andersen Racing race report

Next article IPS: Standings after Mid-Ohio

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

View More & Comment

Latest news

Marc Marquez puts his chances of retiring within three years at 70%

MotoGP

MGP MotoGP

Australian GP

7 min

Marc Marquez puts his chances of retiring within three years at 70%

Audi hands F3 runner-up Freddie Slater F1 practice debut

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

United States GP

43 min

Audi hands F3 runner-up Freddie Slater F1 practice debut

On this day: Fernando Alonso wins the world title, Michael Schumacher retires from F1

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

Brazilian GP

2 h

On this day: Fernando Alonso wins the world title, Michael Schumacher retires from F1

Raul Fernandez still compromised after Indonesia finger injury: “I’m not at 100%”

MotoGP

MGP MotoGP

Australian GP

2 h

Raul Fernandez still compromised after Indonesia finger injury: “I’m not at 100%”

Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.

From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.

You have 2 options:

Become a subscriber.
Disable your adblocker.

Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here

Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page

Manage Alerts