Jan 15, 2004
\nInvercargill, New Zealand \u00e2\u20ac\u201c\u00e2\u20ac\u201c Three Team USA Scholarship drivers have a chance this weekend to join some illustrious company by winning the New Zealand Grand Prix. One of the most prestigious titles in the Southern Hemisphere, the race has been won in the past by some of the most famous names in the sport, including Sir Stirling Moss, Bruce McLaren, Sir Jack Brabham, Sir Jackie Stewart, Graham Hill and John Surtees.The event will count as the second round of the Talley\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s International Formula Ford Series and will be held for the third year running at the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s most southerly race track, Teretonga Park, Invercargill.<\/p>\n
Joe D\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Agostino, 18, from Plantation, Fla., Charlie Kimball, 18, from Camarillo, Calif., and Ryan Millen, 19, from Newport Beach, Calif., tested impressively today at the ultra-fast Teretonga track in their trio of identical, patriotically liveried Team USA Scholarship Stealth\/Van Diemens, and are excited about their prospects.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153This race has a huge history,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Kimball, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153and just being a part of it is really neat. Legendary names in motor racing have won this race, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a great opportunity for us to be able to try and follow in their footsteps.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Teretonga is a great place to hold the race,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d added Kimball, who finished third in both the 2003 U.S. Formula Ford 2000 Zetec Championship and the more recent British Formula Ford Zetec Winter Series. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a real flowing track, kind of like Road America. The first corner is a very fast Carousel kind of corner. If you had five percent more grip you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d maybe be flat-out through there; but you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t so it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an incredibly challenging corner.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
The New Zealand Grand Prix, with a history dating back to 1950, holds a very special significance for Millen, who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s uncle, Steve, won the race in 1980. The youngster contested the event last year, running well until making a mistake, and is determined to make amends this time around.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Big!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is how Millen describes the race. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a really important weekend for me. My uncle\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s won it and I wanted so desperately to win it last year, but just blew it due to my inexperience. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not going to let that happen again.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Millen, who won the 2002\/2003 New Zealand South Island Formula Ford Championship and competed in a handful of Barber Dodge Pro Series races in 2003, certainly should be in the running, along with his teammates. All three finished among the top five in one of last weekend\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s pair of races at Levels Raceway, Timaru — with D\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Agostino leading the way with a pole and a second place — and were among the pacesetters at today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s test.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It went well,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said D\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Agostino, who competed in the 2003 Formula Dodge National Championship Presented by Racer and subsequently won the Barber\/Champ Car Scholarship, worth a fully paid ride in the 2004 Barber Dodge Pro Series. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think the lap times we were running were very good \u00e2\u20ac\u201c as fast as anyone else. The track is going to promote a lot of slipstreaming, so it should be fun \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and fast. And it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really cool to be competing in a race with so much history behind it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jan 15, 2004 Invercargill, New Zealand \u00e2\u20ac\u201c\u00e2\u20ac\u201c Three Team USA Scholarship drivers have a chance this weekend to join some illustrious company by winning the New Zealand Grand Prix. One of the most prestigious titles…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1506,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1505"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1505"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1507,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1505\/revisions\/1507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/teamusascholarship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}