Photo: Indianapolis Motor Speedway, LLC Photography
Indy Lights race-winner Alex Baron added a third USF2000 victory to his CV at St. Petersburg by dominating the second race of the weekend.
Baron was the 2012 French Formula 4 champion, was a USF2000 winner in 2013 and won at Toronto in Indy Lights in 2014. His racing career in America has in recent times been held back by visa issues.
The Frenchman failed to finish the first USF2000 race, but made up for it by taking pole, win and fastest lap in the second.
He was at the head of the field for the duration of the race, which ended under yellow flag conditions due to multiple incidents on the last lap.
Igor Fraga finished second, with Lucas Kohl seucring third ahead of Jamie Caroline and race one winner Kyle Kirkwood.
Caroline sprent most of the race in third, including challenging Fraga, but outbraked himself going into the first corner late in the race and dropped to fifth, although still with enough time to reclaim fourth from Kirkwood.
Jose Sierra finished sixth, having briefly had a shot at getting past Caroline, with Zach Holden, Calvin Ming, Kaylen Frederick and Kory Enders rounding out the top 10.
Rasmus Lindh spent most of the race ahead of that group, despite starting down in 14th, before a high speed crash at the last corner while chasing Kirkwood put him out of the race.
The crash led to a caution period, the restart of which Caroline made his mistake at.
Julian van der Watt was another who should have had a top 10 result, having raced furiously with Lindh, Sierra and Frederick, but a late error led to him dropping to 11th.
Kirkwood still leads the championship, with Sierra, Fraga, Baron and Ming completing the top five.
Race results (25 laps)
1 Alex Baron Swan-RJB Motorsports 32m05.163s
2 Igor Fraga Exclusive Autosport +2.0072s
3 Lucas Kohl Pabst Racing +5.4112s
4 Jamie Caroline BN Racing +5.8753s
5 Kyle Kirkwood Cape Motorsports +6.4352s
6 Jose Sierra DEForce Racing +6.7089s
7 Zach Holden DEForce Racing +10.3995s
8 Calvin Ming Pabst Racing +12.3825s
9 Kaylen Frederick Pabst Racing +13.2106s
10 Kory Enders DEForce Racing +13.8957s
11 Julian van der Watt Team Pelfrey +14.5395s
12?Darren Keane Newman Wachs Racing +15.2984s
13?Keith Donegan ArmsUp Motorsport +17.8019s
14 Bruna Tomaselli Team Pelfrey +18.6553s
15 Kyle Dupell Team Pelfrey +19.3876s
16?Mathias Soler-Obel Sol.O Racing +20.3106s
17?Sabre Cook Team Benik +20.7347s
18?David Osborne Newman Wachs Racing +22.0867s
19 Oscar DeLuzuriaga Newman Wachs Racing +22.9271s
20 Jayson Clunie Exclusive Autosport +23.7519s
NC Manuel Cabrera Exclusive Autosport +2 laps
Ret Colin Kaminsky DEForce Racing
Ret Michael d’Orlando Team Benik
Ret Rasmus Lindh Pabst Racing
Ret Russell McDonough BN Racing
Pole: Baron, 1m12.2574s
Fastest Lap: Baron, 1m12.889s
Championship Standings
1 Kirkwood 48? ?2 Sierra 41? ?3 Fraga 38? ?4 Baron 35? ?5 Ming 32? ?6 Keane 31? ?7 Kohl 30? ?8 van der Watt 27? ?9 Frederick 22? ?10 Tomaselli 21