Lucas Oil School, M1 Concourse Combine to Host Team USA Shootout

RANCHO SANTA MARGARITA, Calif. – The process of determining which two young drivers will carry the patriotic red, white and blue colors of the Team USA Scholarship at the Formula Ford Festival and the Walter Hayes Trophy events later this year in England – and earn an invitation to the end-of-season Mazda Road to Indy $200k USF2000 Scholarship Shootout – will continue with a shootout to be held at the M1 Concourse facility in Pontiac, Mich., on the weekend of September 8/9. The two days of evaluations, both on the track and off, will be held in conjunction with the Lucas Oil School of Racing.

The Team USA Scholarship is one of the most successful and longest established driver development programs in the world. Almost a quarter of the drivers in this year’s Verizon IndyCar Series (five out of 21 full-season campaigners: Charlie Kimball, JR Hildebrand, Josef Newgarden, Conor Daly and Spencer Pigot), plus current sports car stand-outs Dane Cameron, Joel Miller, Joey Hand, Andy Lally, Bryan Sellers and Trent Hindman, are all Team USA alumni.

Six drivers have been invited to participate in the shootout, drawn from a variety of categories and following individual interviews conducted during the recent Verizon IndyCar Series weekend at Mid-Ohio in front of an illustrious panel of judges representing virtually every aspect of the sport.

The finalists are (with age, hometown and current racing affiliation):
• Sabré Cook, 23, Grand Junction, Colo., SCCA GPfour Championship Road Racing
• Elliot Finlayson, 21, Yorkville, Ill., SCCA GPfour Championship/F4 US Championship powered by Honda
• Aaron Jeansonne, 19, Sulphur, La., Lucas Oil School of Racing
• Jonathan Kotyk, 23, Atlantic Beach, Fla., F1600 Championship Series
• Jacob Loomis, 17, Corinth, Texas, F4 US Championship/Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship Powered by Mazda
• David Osborne, 21, Cincinnati, Ohio, F1600 Championship Series

Each candidate will be assigned one of the new-for-2016 Ray GR-RSC Lucas Oil School cars and one brand-new set of Cooper tires for the duration of the shootout, which will be held for the first time on M1’s 1.5-mile Champion Motor Speedway road circuit. An elite judging panel will be confirmed in the coming days.

“We are proud and honored to host the Team USA Scholarship shootout for the second straight year, and we intend to be involved for many more years too,” said Lucas Oil School of Racing Founder and CEO Neil Enerson. “The program has an incredible track record of helping talented young drivers. I’m looking forward to seeing this new crop of youngsters in action.”

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, Honda Performance Development, Robertson Racing, Lucas Oil School of Racing, PitFit Training, RaceCraft1, Sparco USA, RACER Magazine, Speedstar Management, Styled Aesthetic and Manifest Group. For more information, find us on Facebook and Twitter.

About Lucas Oil School:
Founded in 2015, Lucas Oil School of Racing is a Florida based company that offers arrive-and-drive racing schools, race series, and corporate events at locations around the United States. With its fleet of equally prepared race cars and cadre of professional driving coaches, Lucas Oil School of Racing that has quickly established itself as the premier racing driver training program in North America. To learn more about our offerings, visit www.lucasraceschool.com and follow us at www.facebook.com/lucasraceschool.

About M1 Concourse:
M1 Concourse is an 87-acre playground for auto enthusiasts that includes a secure community of 250+ private garages and a state-of-the-art 1.5-mile Performance Track with its own private Motorsports Club. M1 is a place where enthusiasts can keep, show and exercise their vehicles in the company of other enthusiasts and enjoy unforgettable experiences in a social setting unavailable to people who keep their cars at home or in a traditional storage facility. More information at https://m1concourse.com/