Game on in USF2000 as Jeffers wins again at Mid-Ohio

The battle for the USF2000 Presented by Continental Tire championship could not be closer. Exclusive Autosport’s Jack Jeffers, from San Antonio, Texas, claimed a hard-fought victory this morning in the third and final race of the PFC Grand Prix of Mid-Ohio weekend, and is now tied on points with local driver Thomas Schrage, who finished hot on his heels in second place for VRD Racing.

Jeffers currently holds the favor of a tie-break on the basis of one more race win – three to two – than Schrage.

Teddy Musella also was in the fight for the victory at the end of a thrilling race which ended with the top five cars separated by a mere 1.5s after 20 laps around the undulating 2.258-mile, 13-turn road course.

For the third day running, Schrage lined up at the head of the field for the start having earned his third Continental Tire Pole Award of the season by virtue of posting the best of each driver’s second-fastest laps during the lone qualifying session on Friday.

He was hoping for rather better fortune than the past two days, and all seemed well as he maintained his advantage for the first two laps, albeit under intense pressure from Jeffers, who again had started second.

On lap 3, Jeffers executed a brilliant pass for the lead under braking at the end of the long back straightaway, heading into Turn 4, and for a while he seemed to be in a class of his own.

Jeffers was simply imperious during the first 10 laps, quickly opening up a gap of six seconds to the pursuing pack, which was still led by Schrage. But the complexion of the race changed completely when the pace car was scrambled following an incident in Turn 9 when Ryan Giannetta lost control at the exit. Giannetta was collected by Canadian Anthony Martella, who himself had made a mistake earlier while running 10th and was attempting to recover positions.

The restart came with seven laps remaining, and this time Jeffers was unable to shake off his pursuers. Schrage appeared to have marginally the faster car, but Jeffers was inch perfect and held on to score another fine victory, his third of the season.

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"I was able to pull a gap while they [second and third] were battling. I kind of suspected a full-course caution was going to come out because that's the nature of this track, and so it came out," related Jeffers. "We had a good restart, and they were pressuring me the whole race. They've both been very fast all weekend, so I was never going to count them out. I had to go defensive one time in Turn 4 but other than that, I had it covered off and we were able to hold on to the end.

"Road America was a poor performance on my part, and I had to go home and really do some self-reflecting, and just be brutally honest with myself. I'm glad that I could regroup and reset the right way. I had the right team behind me to help me with that. They've never lost faith in me. They've always had my back from day one back in 2023. I have the best team out there. Huge thank you to the whole EA crew.”

Jeffers set his fastest lap of the race last time around, although his hopes of gaining an extra championship point were foiled by Exclusive Autosport teammate, Evan Cooley, who snagged the extra point on the final lap.

Musella was very much part of the lead battle in third, as were Lucas Fecury, who drove by far his best race for Exclusive Autosport, and Friday race winner Caleb Gafrarar (Pabst Racing), who had lost out to Fecury in Turn 4 on lap 14.

The DEForce Racing duo of Jeshua Alianell and Sebastian Garzon were only a second further back in sixth and seventh, having exchanged positions on lap 6, with Christian Cameron, G3 Argyros and Cooley all snapping at their heels.

Alianell’s best showing since he finished on the podium in the first race of the season at St. Petersburg earned him the Tilton Hard Charger Award having lined up 10th on the grid.

The PFC Award once again was claimed by Exclusive Autosport’s Michael Duncalfe and Joshua Cooley as the winning car owners.

Five races remain in the USF2000 Presented by Continental Tire season – a doubleheader up next on the challenging Streets of Toronto in Canada on July 18-20, followed by a tripleheader finale on the West Coast at Portland International Raceway on Aug. 8-10.

Provisional championship points after 13 of 18 races:

1. Jack Jeffers, 288

2. Thomas Schrage, 288

3. Teddy Musella, 256

4. G3 Argyros, 219

5. Caleb Gafrarar, 212

6. Evan Cooley, 190

7. Liam McNeilly, 163

8. Anthony Martella, 156

9. Lucas Fecury, 148

10. Sebastian Garzon, 147.