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Watkins Glen: AFS/AGR IRL IndyCar Race 1 Recap - Victory!
AFS/Andretti Green Racing’s Raphael Matos won his second race of the season in the first race of the Corning Twin 100s. On the first green flag lap of race one, Matos overtook Franck Pererra for the lead and continued to lead 25 of 28 laps. Starting sixth in the second race, Matos grabbed one spot at the start. As the fastest car on the track, he was into second by lap 12. He made up ground quickly on Richard Antinucci in his attempt to win back-to-back races, but ran just a couple of laps short.
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Luyendyk Jr. started 12th in the first race of the doubleheader. He grabbed five spots on the third lap to move into the seventh position where he remained for the duration of the race. For the second race, Luyendyk Jr. started seventh and ran in that position for the 29-lap event.
Matos moved up two spots to second in the Firestone Indy Lights championship, 11 points out of the lead. Luyendyk Jr. is now just two points out of the fourth position.
Next for the Firestone Indy Lights series is the Nashville 100 on Saturday, July 12 from Nashville Superspeedway The race can be seen on a tape-delayed basis on ESPN2 Thursday, July 17 at 2:30 p.m.
Raphael Matos, #27 AFS Racing/Andretti Green Racing Dallara/Honda/Firestone:
"It has been a long time since I’ve been in victory lane. I’m just so happy for the AFS/AGR team. I was just trying to be conservative at the beginning of the first race just to get the tires warm and it worked out for us. It allowed me to get a comfortable gap there at the end of the first race.
For the second race, we didn’t have strong car on the restarts. I almost spun out on the last restart in turn 10. It’s too bad because I knew yesterday in qualifying that the car was going to be great today. Antinucci was very competitive all weekend, which made it tough to get that second win. We had a run there at the end of the second race, but we just came up short. I am still happy with the result for the AFS/Andretti Green team. I really need to thank the AFS/Andretti Green team and everyone that has been supporting us so far this season. This has really put us in a good position for the championship."
Arie Luyendyk Jr., #26 Targus Andretti Green Racing/AFS Racing Dallara/Honda/Firestone:
"The day was pretty good. I think we had a better car than the results showed. We got a little lucky in the first race with the mistakes from other drivers. The Targus/AGR/AFS car was really good. We posted the third quickest time in that first race. The second race was just so hard to pass. I am still happy with two seventh place finishes. We’re just going to look forward to Nashville now. We had a great test there, so hopefully we’ll be able to get that first victory."
PaddockTalk Perspective
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Also in IRL Weekend Team Reports: |
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