PALMETTO, Fla. – The 2024 USF Pro Championships Presented by Continental Tire season will culminate this weekend with the Continental Tire Grand Prix of Portland. The 1.964-mile, 12-turn Portland International Raceway road course will play host to the final rounds for all three series – USF Juniors, USF2000 and USF Pro 2000.
Over $1.6 million remains up for grabs as, uniquely in the world of motorsports, the highly acclaimed open-wheel driver development ladder will award scholarships to enable each champion to move on to the next level in their ultimate quest for a career in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES.
Hughes Holds the Upper Hand
The highest rung on the ladder, USF Pro 2000, has witnessed a thrilling contest fought out primarily by Australia’s Lochie Hughes and Floridian Nikita Johnson, who have been locked in combat since the opening rounds on the streets of St. Petersburg, Fla., in March.
Entry List
Hughes was the first to shine for Turn 3 Motorsport, stepping up after finishing third in last year’s USF2000 championship and claiming a convincing debut victory. VRD Racing’s Johnson then went on a tear, winning four of the next five races and establishing a commanding points lead before another apparent triumph at Indianapolis for Johnson was overturned by a technical infraction.
That disappointment was followed by a crash in the only oval race of the season and difficult weekends at Road America and Toronto, which has put Johnson virtually out of reach of the championship title.
In the meantime, Pabst Racing’s Jace Denmark, from Brownsburg, Ind., has moved stealthily into position as Hughes’ closest challenger for a scholarship valued at $681,500 to ensure advancement to INDY NXT in 2025.
Denmark currently stands 35 points adrift of Hughes’ tally with a total of 66 points still on the table. Surprisingly, Denmark is still in search of his first USF Pro 2000 victory, but after four podium results in 2023 and nine more this year, including the last five consecutive races, he will be striving to set that record straight this weekend at a track where he claimed a USF2000 triumph in 2022.
Entering the weekend, Hughes has been a model of consistency. He has extended his win tally to five, and failed to finish among the top six in only one of the last 11 races to ensure a healthy advantage heading into this weekend’s doubleheader finale.
Two drivers will make their series debuts this weekend as Noah Ping, from Buford, Ga., joins VRD Racing after competing in the European GB3 championship for the past couple of years and Tanner DeFabis, from Avon, Ind., steps up from USF2000 with Jay Howard Driver Development after winning at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park in May.
Garcia Closes on USF2000 Title
The last four seasons of USF2000 Presented by Continental Tire have ended with a different team at the top of the pecking order. Last year, after falling agonizingly short on a regular basis over the course of the past decade, Pabst Racing broke through in style for its first driver’s championship as Simon Sikes scored six race wins, seven poles and nine fastest race laps.
Augie Pabst’s Wisconsin-based team has continued that momentum this season. Max Garcia, from Coconut Grove, Fla., started out with three straight victories and since then has added a string of consistent finishes to ensure a relatively comfortable 35-point advantage over teammate Sam Corry, from Cornelius, N.C., heading into this weekend’s tripleheader finale.
Entry List
A win and a third-place finish last month on the streets of Toronto kept Corry firmly in contention for the championship, with a total of 99 points up for grabs, although the “form man” of late has been VRD Racing’s Max Taylor. The 16-year-old from Hoboken, N.J., has won three of the last six races and only once has failed to finish among the top five since the opening weekend of the season.
Taylor, who is also leading the USF Juniors title-chase, now lies only seven points adrift of Corry in an unprecedented quest to secure both championships, while Evagoras Papasavvas, who was born in Kirkland, Wash., but is now based in Ohio, kept alive his hopes of lifting the crown by winning the most recent race in Toronto for Jay Howard Driver Development – his eighth podium of the season.
Taylor Turns the Tables
USF Juniors has provided some spectacular action this year as a record-sized field chases a scholarship valued at $263,700 to ensure graduation to the next step, USF2000, in 2025. This weekend’s tripleheader finale boils down to a four-man scrap for top honors.
Entry List
Max Taylor (VRD Racing), from Hoboken, N.J., Israel’s Ariel Elkin (InterMS), Sebastian Wheldon (VRD Racing), from Coral Gables, Fla., and Englishman Liam McNeilly (Jay Howard Driver Development) have shared the four most recent race wins and are currently separated by 50 points with a total of 99 points still available.
Taylor trailed the other three contenders for the majority of the season, but a blend of outright pace and admirable consistency – he is the only driver to have completed every racing lap and finished among the top 10 in all 13 starts – has catapulted him to a 40-point advantage over Elkin.
Elkin and the InterMS team are both new to USF Juniors, although prior experience in a variety of F4 series has enabled them to take the fight to the front-runners. Elkin was the class of the field at Barber Motorsports Park in April, sweeping both race victories.
Former standout karter Wheldon, 15, has slipped to third in the points table after leading the way for the majority of the season. Wheldon emerged triumphant from last year’s Skip Barber Formula Race Series, securing a $100,000 scholarship to make the step up to USF Juniors, and continued his prodigious form by romping to victory in two of the opening three races at NOLA Motorsports Park.
Some unfortunate incidents and a couple of penalties have blunted Wheldon’s challenge, but he rebounded impressively by drafting past Elkin and claiming the narrowest of victories in the most recent race at Road America, so will arrive in Portland with momentum on his side.
McNeilly also has experienced some misfortune during his rookie season in North America. A hat-trick of podium finishes and two pole positions at NOLA set him off on the right foot, although since then he has been involved in several scrapes – mostly not of his making. Despite that he remains firmly in the title mix.
USF Pro Championships will hit the ground running with eight races over the course of two days – Friday and Saturday – following a test day on Thursday. Full live coverage can be found on the free USF Pro Championships App, YouTube channel and respective series’ websites, usfpro2000.com, usf2000.com and usfjuniors.com.
