Hawksworth Wins Star Mazda Pole #7 at Trois-Rivieres

Jack Hawksworth collected his seventh PEAK Performance Pole Award of the 2012 season with a record-breaking run in his #82 Team Pelfrey / TORGOEN Swiss Watches / EXA Networks Mazda. On the 26th lap of the afternoon qualifying session for tomorrow's Race 1 of the Star Mazda Championship presented by Goodyear at the 43rd annual GP3R, Hawksworth bettered the existing lap record of 1:01.341 – set in 2009 by Rusty Mitchell – with a time of 1:00.850.

His quick time was just .042 quicker than arch-rival Connor De Phillippi, who will – for the first time this season – start alongside Hawksworth on the front row in his #82 Team Pelfrey / TORGOEN Swiss Watches / EXA Networks Mazda. De Phillippi won Star Mazda Race 2 here last year, and this year is fourth in the championship with two wins, two poles and four podiums.

And starting immediately behind Hawksworth is yet another hungry championship contender, Sage Karam, with a lap of 1:01.134 in the #88 Andretti Autosport / Comfort Revolution Mazda. He finished 4th in Race 1 and 5th in Race 2 here last year, and went on to become the 2011 Rookie of the Year. He is currently third in the championship with one win, one pole and six podium finishes.

"It was a really tight qualifying and it's going to be a tight race… I'm hoping we all get through the first turn," said Hawksworth, with five wins, seven poles and eight fastest laps. "It's a really good thing for our race plan to be starting on the pole here, and to keep it on the start and re-starts. This is a really small track, though it's really well laid-out, and it requires a lot of precision, but the Pelfrey team keeps giving me really good cars, so we're well-positioned for tomorrow."

The 'ringer' in the field, two-time Trois-Rivieres race winner (2009 and 2010) Alex Ardoin, will start from 9th on the grid with a lap of 1:01.725 in the #51 Team GDT Mazda. This is his first race of the season, and he crashed early in practice, compromising his team's chances of finding the ideal setup for his car. Local driver, Jeremy Daniel, from Chateauguay, Quebec, qualified 18th, turning a 1:03.362 in his #10 The Racing Company / FixAuto / Sherwin-Williams Mazda.

Results

Pos	No.	Name	Best Tm	In Lap	Diff	Gap	Team	Laps
1	82	Jack Hawksworth	1:00.850	26	–	–	Pelfrey	33
2	2	Connor De Phillippi	1:00.892	26	0.042	0.042	Juncos Racing	28
3	88	Sage Karam	1:01.134	27	0.284	0.242	Andretti	31
4	83	Gustavo Menezes	1:01.245	23	0.395	0.111	Pelfrey	36
5	19	Gabby Chaves	1:01.409	30	0.559	0.164	JDC Motorsports	34
6	22	Martin Scuncio	1:01.422	23	0.572	0.013	Juncos Racing	33
7	77	Zach Veach	1:01.423	34	0.573	0.001	Andretti	35
8	81	Petri Suvanto	1:01.437	31	0.587	0.014	Pelfrey	35
9	51	Alex Ardoin	1:01.727	13	0.877	0.290	GDT	24
10	57	Diego Ferreira	1:01.791	25	0.941	0.064	Juncos Racing	27
11	15	Bruno Palli	1:01.872	25	1.022	0.081	Juncos Racing	26
12	9	Juan Piedrahita	1:02.098	17	1.248	0.226	JDC Motorsports	26
13	20	Carlos Linares	1:02.255	30	1.405	0.157	Linares Racing	31
14	33	Ryan Tveter	1:02.498	20	1.648	0.243	Team GDT	20
15	91	Ashley Freiberg	1:02.628	20	1.778	0.130	JDC Motorsports	34
16	53	Andres Mendez	1:02.797	20	1.947	0.169	Team GDT	30
17	66	Zack Meyer	1:02.926	23	2.076	0.129	Aim Autosport	32
18	10	Jeremy Daniel	1:03.362	13	2.512	0.436	TRC	31

Star Mazda on-track action at the GP3R at Trois-RiviÃ¨res continues with Saturday's Race 1, scheduled for 45 minutes; the grid will take the green light for the series' spectacular F1-style standing start 1:20 pm – 2:10 pm 45 minutes on Saturday, August 4. Race 2, also a 45-minute contest with the starting grid determined by each car's fastest lap on Race 1, takes the green at 11:00 am on Sunday, August 5.

Star Mazda Championship cars all carry two Replay XD1080 cameras to provide exciting driver POV footage for races that are part of the Mazda Motorsports Hour broadcast tape-delayed on Discovery's Velocity Channel in the U.S. and globally on ESPN International. In the U.S., the race will air on Velocity at 12 Noon, Saturday, September 1. In Canada, the Mazda Motorsports Hour airs on Rogers Sports Net; please check your local listings for date and time, or go to http://www.sportsnet.ca/tvschedule.