Home News Kirkwood does the USF2000 double in chaotic Toronto races

Kirkwood does the USF2000 double in chaotic Toronto races

by Ida Wood

Photo: Indianapolis Motor Speedway / LLC Photography

Kyle Kirkwood won both USF2000 races at Toronto, extending his victory run to six and his championship lead to 131 points.

Kirkwood missed out on both poles, a but it only took the run to Turn 1 in the first race before he was in the lead. Poleman Dakota Dickerson of ArmsUp Motorsports kept Kirkwood under pressure for the duration.

An early caution period caused by a crash between Jose Sierra and Darren Keane was the only interruption in the race, but the results were close anyway, with the top 10 split by just over seven seconds.

Kaylen Frederick beat Pabst Racing team-mate Rasmus Lindh in a close battle for third, with the third Pabst car of Calvin Ming losing out on fifth to BN Racing’s Keith Donegan.

Exclusive Autosport’s Igor Fraga and Danial Frost finished seventh and eighth, with Lucas Kohl and Julian Van der Watt completing the top 10 for Pabst and Team Pelfrey.

Frederick broke the track record to take pole for the second race. His victory hopes ended at Turn 3 on the first lap though when he ended up going down the escape road while defending from Donegan. Lindh followed Frederick down the escape road, while Donegan slid into the barriers. Dickerson was spun by Ming, and Kirkwood emerged as the leader at the end of the first lap.

A caution period was required, and on the restart Kirkwood was bettered by Fraga for the lead. It took until lap 17 of 25 for him to get back past thanks to some staunch defence from Fraga, but once through the second win of the weekend was of little difficulty for Kirkwood.

Fraga matched his best result of the season in second, with Lindh completing the podium. The Swede had been 11th at the end of the first lap, but didn’t take long to break into the top six. He came on top in a thrilling battle with team-mate Frederick, and cleared Frost to finish in third place.

Fourth for Frost was an impressive result considering the Singaporean only made his championship debut at the last event at Road America.

Van der Watt finished fifth ahead of Dickerson, who recovered from his first lap move, and Sierra, who started 18th.

Frederick managed to finish eighth, conceding a significant number of points to title rival Kirkwood. The absent Alex Baron slipped from second to fifth in the standings. Kirkwood could realistically secure the title in the next event at Mid-Ohio, which runs as a triple-header.

Results round-up
Race 1 (20 laps)
1 Kyle Kirkwood Cape Motorsports 28m27.6021s
2 Dakota Dickerson ArmsUp Motorsports +0.3613s
3 Kaylen Frederick Pabst Racing +1.1038s
4 Rasmus Lindh Pabst Racing +1.5180s
5 Keith Donegan BN Racing +2.1012s
6 Calvin Ming Pabst Racing +2.7054s
7 Igor Fraga Exclusive Autosport +3.3265s
8 Danial Frost Exclusive Autosport +4.6867s
9 Lucas Kohl Pabst Racing +5.7392s
10 Julian Van der Watt Team Pelfrey +7.1305s
Pole: Dickerson, 1m12.6620s
Fastest lap: Lindh, 1m11.1234s

Race 2 (25 laps)
1 Kirkwood 34m21.3958s
2 Fraga +1.1127s
3 Lindh +3.2225s
4 Frost +10.3767s
5 Van der Watt +12.5651s
6 Dickerson +13.5875s
7 Jose Sierra DEForce Racing +28.9639s
8 Frederick +29.0661s
9 Kyle Dupell Team Pelfrey +40.4296s
10 Oscar DeLuzuriaga Newman Wachs Racing +43.7451s
P: Frederick, 1m10.7699s
FL: Lindh, 1m10.9853s

Championship standings
1
Kirkwood 279 ? 2 Frederick 148 ? 3 Fraga 145 ? 4 Lindh 141? ?5 Alex Baron 123 ? 6 Kohl 116 ? 7 Ming 113 ? 8 Sierra 110 ? 9 Donegan 100 ? 10 Darren Keane 96