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ZACH VEACH ADDS TWO TOP-TEN FINISH AT HOMETRACK OF MID-OHIO
Veach Recorded A Fifth and A Seventh Place Finishe At Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.

LEXINGTON, OH (August 7, 2011) – Ohio native, Andretti Autosport driver Zach Veach, returned from a nearly two-month hiatus in the USF2000 racing schedule with two race events at his home track at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course as a support series to the IZOD IndyCar Series' headliner, the Honda Indy 200. Veach scored two top-10 finishes in his first start at the 50-year-old racing facility.

"In yesterday's race, we didn't get off on the start as well as we wanted to, which dropped us behind the sixth place car," said Veach. "I spent the first half of the race trying to get by him, so we didn't get a quick lap in for qualifying for today's race and ended up starting fifth. Today's start was a little better; it's something I'm definitely working on. From there, it was just about trying to get the car tuned in. We struggled all weekend with car setup, so I'm ready to put it behind us. Road America will be better as we were fast there last year and put the car on the podium. You'll have bad weekends sometimes, and this was it for us. The championship is not over yet, and Team Zakosi Data Backup is still going for wins."

Opening the weekend in his No. 7 Zakosi Data Backup Mazda with a promoter test day, Veach traded the top spots on the speed chart between his teammate Spencer Pigot, Cape Motorsports with Wayne Taylor Racing's Petri Suvanto, and Belardi Auto Racing's Wayne Boyd throughout the weekend before settling in at fourth in qualifying for the first race event.

Veach fell from fourth to six at the start and found himself in a three-car battle for fifth with Brian Stewart Racing's Matthew Di Leo and Juan Piedrahita of JDC Motorsports before securing the position at the checkered flag.

"We've been battling the car all weekend, added Veach. "We wanted to try a few things that worked for my teammate, which seemed to help a lot. On the start a car behind me locked up his brakes, and it was either get taken out or get passed by a couple cars. After that, we just tried to work our way up the field. We were able to get up to fifth but by the end of the race, there just wasn't enough track to make any more passes. I have to thank Team Zakosi Data Backup for their hard work this weekend."

With his results at Mid-Ohio, Veach added two more top-10 finishes to put him at eight top-10 finishes on the season, along with three pole positions and a race win. Prior to opening the 2011 season, Veach used two race wins and three pole positions to capture the inaugural Cooper Tires presents the USF2000 Winterfest Championship in January 2011.

Veach returns to the racetrack on Aug. 18 for opening practice at Road America and two rounds of racing in support of the American LeMan Series' Time Warner Cable Road Race Showcase. In 2010, Veach had two third-place finishes at the four-mile, fourteen-turn professional racing circuit in Elkhart Lake, WI.

Sanctioned by INDYCAR, the USF2000 National Championship, presented by Cooper Racing Tires and powered by Mazda, is one of three series part of both INDYCAR's "Mazda Road to Indy" ladder system and the MAZDASPEED Motorsports Development driver program.