Tuesday, October 21, 2008
2006 SBN champ Jonathan Goring (that's his father Keith on the right) added another title to his ledger: 2008 IMSA Lites One.
Jonathan Goring, the 2006 BFGoodrich/Skip Barber National Presented by Mazda champion, continued his victorious ways by clinching this year's IMSA Lites One championship with a decisive victory in the second-to-last race, at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca October 18. Driving for Comprent Motorsports, Goring took pole for all 12 races, and won nine races in 11 starts (he didn't enter the last race on Sunday, having clinched the title in Saturday's race). ''This is an unbelievable feeling,'' Goring said after his title clinching win over Matt Downs. ''Comprent has done an unbelievable job all season long… I couldn't ask for more.'' IMSA Lites One is the top of a three-class championship and is comprised of team-owned Elan Motorsports Technologies DP-02 chassis: a sports prototype-style carbon-fiber chassis with a six-speed sequential box and full aero package. The DP-02 is powered by the 2.3-liter, 4-cylinder Mazda MP2 engine, sealed by Elan Power Products. In 2006, Goring won four races and took three poles in the Skip Barber National to beat Marco Di Leo and Alexander Rossi to the title.
2004 SBN driver John Edwards is now the 2008 Star Mazda champion...
... while the 2007 SBN titlist, Joel Miller (white #70), was championship runner-up in Star Mazda.
More success in the MAZDASPEED Motorsports Development ladder system was found by
Jonathan Edwards and
Joel Miller in the Star Mazda Championship Presented by Goodyear. Miller is the 2007 BFGoodrich/Skip Barber National Presented by Mazda champion, while Edwards competed in the Skip Barber Regional in 2003 and the Skip Barber National in 2004 as a 13-year-old. Despite missing the Star Mazda season opener, Edwards, driving the #7 AIM Autosport/Mobil 1 Mazda, went on to win four races and in the season finale at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca October 18, Edwards came home in second place to race winner Richard Kent to clinch the 2008 Star Mazda title. In the #20 JDC Motorsports/K&N Filters/Skip Barber Mazda, Miller won the season opener, took two pole positions and finished on the podium seven other times in the year's 12 races to secure championship runner-up honors. Edwards said, "I came into this season with idea of winning the championship and with it the MAZDASPEED Motorsports Driver Development Ladder scholarship that would let me go back up to racing in the Atlantic Championship in 2009, and obviously we accomplished that.'' Edwards won from the pole in his Star Mazda debut in Round 2 at Miller Motorsports Park. "I was the youngest driver ever in Atlantic last year and didn't achieve the results I wanted, but I learned a lot in the Star Mazda Championship that will make me a stronger Atlantic competitor next year. ''It's been a tough, competitive season full of wheel-banging and off-course excursions and races won by both skill and luck,'' Edwards said. ''I'm delighted to win the Star Mazda championship and the MAZDASPEED scholarship at Mazda Raceway; it seems right, of course!'' Rick Roso
