USF Pro2000

DOUBLE THE PLEASURE FOR PENSKE-BACKED DRIVER. MYLES AHEAD OF THE COMPETITION.

Sebring, Florida. 22-year-old Myles Rowe, after winning more races than any other driver in the USF2000 championship last year, is on a hot roll in the 2023 USF Pro2000 series.

The season opener in Saint Petersburg saw him on the podium in third place in the first race. In only his second start in the series, Rowe recorded an impressive victory on Sunday enabling him to grab the championship lead.

The series stayed in Florida for Round 2 on the bumpy Sebring track, famous for staging the annual 12-Hour race and the very first Formula 1 United States Grand Prix in 1959.

Race 1

Rowe started from the front row alongside his Pabst Racing teammate from Arizona, Jace Denmark. Rowe grabbed the lead early in the race going into Turn 3 and never looked back.

What he is looking forward to is the lucrative career-advancing prize for winning the championship; $664,500 Discount Tires Driver Advancement Scholarship taking him into Indy NXT, the final frontier before the top tier in American racing, Indy cars.

Rowe said after the race, “That move on lap one was crucial because I didn’t know how the racing was going to be today. In practice, the aero push was insane, so I knew I had to make a move early. It was a good clean move and we got it done.”

Race 2

Starting the second race on Saturday from third on the grid, Rowe was moving rapidly at the start, and was leading the pack of several talented drivers after the first turn. While battle raged on for several positions behind him Rowe pulled ahead a comfortable lead. The only time competition gave him company was courtesy of the first full course yellow.

He was again able to pull a lead at the restart, but then a second late race FCY again bunched up the field.

Green means go and that’s what the young Brazilian driver Kiko Porto did and raced side-by-side with Rowe to the first turn, but the Penske Entertainment driver was again able to put on a winning show to win both races of the weekend and establish a commanding lead early in the season.

“It was the race of my life honestly,” Rowe said. “Now that it is all over, I have been trying to close out a weekend winning all of the races since I was 14. It’s been a long road to dominate a weekend and we finally did it today. I’m just ecstatic, my family is ecstatic, the team is ecstatic – I couldn’t be happier.

“It was also thrilling because it was so calm, cool and collected for 10 of the laps or so and then a full course caution came out when I had an almost 5s gap. Then here I am on the last lap defending three corners on the track to make sure I could hold my spot. Luckily, I kept my head down and we did it.

“I have to send a big thank-you to Pabst Racing, Force Indy, Penske Entertainment, Sparco, Bell, SimCraft and NXG – all of them. This wouldn’t be possible without them.”

Double the pleasure in Sebring gives Rowe a Florida fresh juicy championship lead of 42 points over second place Porto.

– – Nasir Hameed.