The 2015 Pro Mazda Championship was the 17th season in
series
Series may refer to:
People with the name
* Caroline Series (born 1951), English mathematician, daughter of George Series
* George Series (1920–1995), English physicist
Arts, entertainment, and media
Music
* Series, the ordered sets used i ...
history. The series consisted of sixteen races at nine tracks, having expanded from fourteen races in 2014; adding races at
NOLA Motorsports Park
NOLA Motorsports Park is a full service motorsports facility in Avondale, Louisiana approximately twenty minutes from downtown New Orleans. NOLA Motorsports Park includes an FIA, FIA Grade 2 road course, one of the largest (fully-lit) outdoor kart ...
, the
Streets of Toronto
Exhibition Place is a publicly owned mixed-use district in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located by the shoreline of Lake Ontario, just west of downtown. The site includes exhibit, trade, and banquet centres, theatre and music buildings, monuments, ...
,
Iowa Speedway
Iowa Speedway is a 7/8-mile (1.4 km) paved oval motor racing track in Newton, Iowa, United States, approximately east of Des Moines. It has over 25,000 permanent seats as well as a unique multi-tiered RV viewing area along the backstretch ...
and
Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca
Laguna Seca Raceway (branded as WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, and previously Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca) is a paved road racing track in central California used for both auto racing and motorcycle racing, built in 1957 near both Salinas and M ...
, while dropping races at Houston, Milwaukee and
Sonoma Raceway
Sonoma Raceway (originally known as Sears Point Raceway from 1967 to 1980 and 1982 to 2002, Golden State International Raceway in 1981 and Infineon Raceway from 2002 to 2012) is a road course and dragstrip located at Sears Point in the southern S ...
. The season began on March 28 at the
Grand Prix of St. Petersburg
The Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg is an IndyCar Series race held in St. Petersburg, Florida. In most years since 2009, the race has served as the season opener (or at minimum, the first race held on U.S. soil). The race is held annually ...
and ended on September 13 at Laguna Seca.
Uruguay's
Santiago Urrutia
Santiago Urrutia Lausarot (born 30 August 1996) is an Uruguayan racing driver. He currently competes in the World Touring Car Cup, driving for Cyan Performance Lynk & Co. He formerly competed in Indy Lights, and was the 2015 Pro Mazda series ch ...
became the first champion from South America since
Raphael Matos
Raphael Matos (born August 28, 1981) is a Brazilian professional racing driver. He was the 2008 Firestone Indy Lights Series champion and the 2007 Champ Car Atlantic Series champion. He lives in Miami.
Career highlights
Early career
Born in Bel ...
in 2005, driving for Team Pelfrey. Urrutia, who joined the series for the 2015 season after a year in
GP3,
won only three races during the season – at NOLA Motorsports Park, the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway
The Indianapolis Motor Speedway is an automobile racing circuit located in Speedway, Indiana, an enclave suburb of Indianapolis, Indiana. It is the home of the Indianapolis 500 and the Verizon 200, and and formerly the home of the United State ...
and
Mid-Ohio
Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course is a road course auto racing facility located in Troy Township, Morrow County, Ohio, United States, just outside the village of Lexington. Mid-Ohio has also colloquially become a term for the entire north-central regio ...
– but consistent finishing (finishing 14 of 16 races in the top-5) saw him finish 53 points clear of his nearest rival in the championship standings. Second place in the standings went to Cape Motorsports driver
Neil Alberico
Neil Ryan Alberico (born October 7, 1992) is a racing driver from Los Gatos, California, United States.
Alberico made his professional debut in the 2012 U.S. F2000 National Championship from JDC Motorsports. He returned to the series in 2013 fro ...
, holding off a late-season challenge from
Juncos Racing
Juncos Hollinger Racing, formerly Juncos Racing, is an Argentine-American racing team competing in the NTT IndyCar Series, Indy Lights and Indy Pro 2000 Championship series in the Road to Indy ladder for IndyCar. Owned by Ricardo Juncos, who form ...
's Garett Grist for the position, by a tally of eight points. Alberico won four races during the season – which was the most by any driver, shared with
Andretti Autosport
Andretti Autosport is an auto racing team that competes in the IndyCar Series, Indy Lights, Indy Pro 2000, and Formula E. The team also has a 37.5% ownership stake in the Australian Supercars Championship touring car team, Walkinshaw Andretti ...
's
Weiron Tan
Weiron Tan (born 3 December 1994) is a Malaysian racing driver.
Career
Karting
Weiron was first introduced to go-karts at the age of 13, and by the age of 15 he was the first Malaysian champion in the PLUS Yamaha SL Cup Championship and th ...
– while Grist won three of the final six races including a weekend sweep at Laguna Seca.
Tan himself finished fourth in the championship, as five finishes outside the top ten as well as a five-point penalty early in the season hampered his championship bid. The championship top five was completed by France's Timothé Buret of Juncos Racing, one point behind Tan, who was a race-winner at Indianapolis. The only other race winner was
Florian Latorre
Florian Latorre (born April 24, 1997 in Libourne, France) is a French racing driver from Auriolles, France. He currently competes in the FIA World Endurance Championship for TF Sport.
Career
Latorre made his professional debut in the 2013 U.S. ...
, a compatriot of Buret, who won on the Streets of Toronto for Cape Motorsports. He finished eighth in the drivers' championship, due to the result being one of only three podium finishes during the season. In the teams' championship, Juncos Racing won the title mainly due to the results for Grist and Buret, with other team drivers José Gutiérrez and
Will Owen
William James Owen (18 February 1901 – 3 April 1981) was a British miner and Labour Party politician, whose career as a Member of Parliament was ended by his trial under the Official Secrets Act 1911 for giving secrets to Czechoslovak intelli ...
. Juncos finished 39 points clear of Team Pelfrey.
The expert drivers' championship for older drivers was won by World Speed Motorsports driver Bobby Eberle, taking 11 class wins during 2015.
Drivers and teams
Race calendar and results
Championship standings
Drivers' championship
* Ties in points broken by number of wins, or best finishes.
* The first race at the Indianapolis road course was a makeup for the canceled race at NOLA. Drivers who were not at NOLA were ineligible to score points in that race.
Teams' championship
Notes
References
External links
*
{{Road to Indy
Pro Mazda Championship
The USF Pro 2000 Championship Presented by Cooper Tires, formerly known as the Star Mazda Championship, Pro Mazda Championship, and later Indy Pro 2000 Championship, is an Open-wheel car, open-wheel racing series serving as the third step on th ...
Indy Pro 2000 Championship