Castaneda Sweeps Opening Round of COTA Championship

After a very short off season, Californian Troy Castaneda is back in action kicking off the 2010 season in perfect form. This past weekend, Troy competed in the first round of the Gatorz Challenge of the Americas Championship in Glendale, AZ at the PKRA race track. The COTA Championship is a 3 race weekend championship with 2 races per weekend. The Champion of the Rotax International, Junior Rotax and DD2 classes receive a qualifying spot to the Rotax World Finals.

Once again, Castaneda is competing in the Rotax DD2 class and this past weekend he proved that he is a strong contender for the championship. Each race weekend consists of two complete race days including morning practice, qualifying, heat race and main event. On Saturday, Troy qualified on pole, took the win in the heat race and took the win in the main event by over 10 seconds. Sunday would be no different although at the start of the main event, Castaneda would drop back to second. On the second lap Troy saw an opportunity in turn 8 to overtake for the lead and took advantage of it. Coming onto the long back straight, Castaneda was drafted and dropped again back into second place. Side by side, entering the fast, banked turn 10, Troy took his competitor deep into the braking zone. As his competitor slid wide, Troy took the inside and the lead. From that moment on, Castaneda commanded the race setting extremely consistent laps within one tenth of each other.

“This weekend was fantastic,” exclaimed Troy. “A big, big thank you to SSC Racing, Bariani Olive Oil, Marin Karting, APDW and of course my mechanic and tuner Diego Valverde. I can’t wait until the next race!”

The next round of the Gatorz COTA Championship will take place February 26th through February 28th at the CalSpeed Karting center in Fontana, CA.