Team USA Alumni Honored at Mazda Road to Indy Banquet

Pigot Wins Indy Lights title and a $1 million scholarship, as Alberico, Eidson and Telitz Earn Top-Three Awards

Rancho Santa Margarita, Calif. – Team USA Scholarship alumni Neil Alberico, Aaron Telitz, Spencer Pigot and Jake Eidson all played starring roles on Monday evening as the ground-breaking Mazda Road to Indy open-wheel development ladder concluded its 2015 season with a Champions Celebration awards banquet in Monterey, Calif.

Pigot, 21, from Orlando, Fla., was the evening’s big winner, taking home a $1 million scholarship prize and other awards after clinching the Indy Lights Presented by Cooper Tires championship title in style, winning both of the final two events in the 16-race season at nearby Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca for the Juncos Racing team.

In addition to a pair of Team USA Scholarship awards, in 2010 and 2011, Pigot now has won four Mazda scholarships, commencing his extraordinary run of success in 2009 when he won the Skip Barber Racing Karting Shootout. He parlayed that into another scholarship the following year after winning the BFGoodrich/Skip Barber National Series. After an impressive two seasons in the Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship Powered by Mazda, which brought 12 victories plus a Cooper Tires Winterfest title, Pigot progressed onto the next step of the Mazda Road to Indy, the Pro Mazda Championship Presented by Cooper Tires, which he won in 2014 to secure a scholarship prize which enabled him to graduate into Indy Lights in 2015. Pigot’s latest championship and scholarship will guarantee him entry into three races in the 2016 Verizon Indy Car Series including the historic 100th Indianapolis 500-Mile Race.

Alberico, Eidson and Telitz have every intention of following Pigot’s lead. Alberico, 22, a two-time Team USA Scholarship winner, in 2011 and 2013, from Los Gatos, Calif., clinched second place in this year’s Pro Mazda title-chase, driving for Cape Motorsports with Wayne Taylor Racing.

One step behind him on the ladder, Eidson, 20, from Littleton, Colo., who won a Team USA Scholarship in 2013, and 2014 winner Telitz, 23, from Birchwood, Wis., placed second and third in the USF2000 championship.

The Team USA Scholarship in 2015 is celebrating 25 years of providing opportunities for American race car drivers. Buddy Rice, a scholarship winner in 1997, is so far the only Team USA alum to have won the Indianapolis 500 as a driver, although J.R. Hildebrand (’05) came agonizingly close before ultimately finishing second in 2011. Coincidentally, the first two scholarship winners, Jimmy Vasser (1990), whose own successful career included an IndyCar championship in ’96, and Bryan Herta (’91), also an IndyCar race winner, went on to claim “500″ victories as team owners, in 2013 and 2011, respectively. Championship-winning alumni also include Paul Edwards (’98), Andy Lally (’99), Joey Hand (’00), Dane Cameron (’06), Conor Daly and Josef Newgarden (’08), Trent Hindman (’11) and Matthew Brabham (’12).

This year two more drivers will be selected to follow in their footsteps.

About Team USA Scholarship:
The program has been providing opportunities for talented American race car drivers at an early stage in their careers since 1990. Supporters include Doug Mockett & Company, the Road Racing Drivers Club and SAFEisFAST.com, Cooper Tire & Rubber Company, Team Penske, Mazda, Chip Ganassi Racing, Basecamp.com, Afterburner Autosport, Honda Performance Development, Robertson Racing, Masters HGP, Allen Berg Racing Schools, CXC Simulations, Auto Club Speedway, Ellis Clowes North America, PitFit Training, RaceCraft1, Sparco USA, RACER Magazine, Speedstar Management, Styled Aesthetic and Manifest Group.