RLR/Andersen Racing Comes Home to Mid-Ohio
By Linda Mansfield
If home is where the heart is, RLR/Andersen Racing has come home this
weekend to Mid-Ohio.
The 2.258-mile, 13-turn road course has generated special memories for
the team for years. More chapters of that story will be written this weekend, as
the team fields cars for Andrew Prendeville and J.R. Hildebrand in twin
40-lap Firestone Indy Lights races here Saturday and Sunday. Prendeville, a native
of Chatham Township, N.J. who now lives in Las Vegas, will be in the Best
Friends Animal Society No. 5. Hildebrand, who hails from Sausalito, Calif., and
now resides in Indianapolis, drives the Allied Interior Products No. 25 for the
team, which is sponsored by Allied Building Products Corporation.
Their black, silver and red cars are just the latest race cars that
Andersen Racing has entered in races at Mid-Ohio. Last weekend the team fielded
four Formula 2000 cars in another doubleheader here. Jonny Baker (England);
Anders Krohn (Norway); Doug Prendeville (Andrew's older brother from Whippany,
N.J.), and Scott Willard (Weston, Conn.) are Andersen Racing's drivers in that
series this season. All drive Van Diemens, as Andersen Racing is Van Diemen's
factory team in F2000.
Although the Star Mazda series isn't racing at Mid-Ohio this year,
Andersen Racing typically fields four or five cars in that series too. Sanctioned
by IMSA, the same organization that sanctions the American Le Mans Series cars
racing in the Acura Sports Car Challenge here at Mid-Ohio this weekend, the
Star Mazda set will be racing at Portland International Raceway in Portland,
Ore., next weekend. Andersen Racing's international roster of Star Mazda drivers
include Peter Dempsey (Ireland); Tom Gladdis (a native of the Isle of Wight
now living in Gibraltar); Juliana Gonzalez (Mexico); Charles Hall (England) and
Valle Makela (Finland).
Why does one team field all these race cars for all these drivers in all
these different series? It's all part of the team's three-step program to
provide the best training possible for up-and-coming open-wheel drivers who want
to make a career in the sport. Andersen Racing drivers can progress from
F2000 to Star Mazda and then to the Firestone Indy Lights series, after which
they'll hopefully have what it takes to attract the attention of an IndyCar owner.
To help advance that goal even further, the team moved from Fairfield, N.J.
to Palmetto, Fla. late last year after it purchased a 1-mile road course there
to enhance its testing program.
But that's only part of the story. Although Andersen Racing's F2000 and
Star Mazda cars are headquartered in Florida year-round, its Firestone Indy
Lights cars "summer" at Rahal Letterman Racing's headquarters in Hilliard, Ohio,
to cut down on travel expenses. That's part of a special relationship
between Andersen Racing and RLR. Andersen Racing is the official development team of
Rahal Letterman Racing, which will field the Team Ethanol No. 17 for Ryan
Hunter-Reay in Sunday's Honda Indy 200.
Another Rahal will be competing in the IndyCar race here too. That
person, of course, is Bobby Rahal's son Graham, who spent a season racing Star
Mazda cars with Andersen Racing in 2005 before he advanced to Atlantics and then
on to Champ Car and IndyCar. He drives the Hole in the Wall Camps No. 06 for
Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing in IndyCar.
Andersen Racing's love affair with Mid-Ohio goes back much further than
its relationship with the Rahals, however. It stretches back to the nineties,
as Mike Andersen won three SCCA Formula Continental national championships here
at the Runoffs in 1999, 2001 and 2003, all in Van Diemens. Mike is the son
of Andersen Racing co-owner Dan Andersen, and nephew of the team's other
co-owner, John Andersen.
Mike Andersen still dons his helmet occasionally, and competed in a F2000
race here at Mid-Ohio last July. But now he has additional responsibilities,
as he's chief financial officer of Andersen Racing. He also provides
information technology and data/engineering support for all of the team's engineers;
does some driver coaching; and maintains the team's Web site at
andersenracingteam.com.
In addition to being a team co-owner, Dan Andersen has also promoted
races here at Mid-Ohio. Along with Long Island's Mike Foschi, he staged many
Formula 2000 races at Mid-Ohio in the nineties during the 10 years they owned the
U.S. F2000 national championship series.
It's obvious that Mid-Ohio has played an important role in the Andersen
family history, but it's also been important in the lives of the racing
Prendeville brothers, Andrew and Doug. Andrew and Doug finished first and second,
respectively, in the SCCA Formula Continental national championship at the
Valvoline Runoffs here at Mid-Ohio in 2002. Together they were co-rookies of the
year that season.
Andrew Prendeville is in his sophomore season in Firestone Indy Lights
this year. Last year he drove his heart out here, qualifying third and
finishing fourth. The team had to work hard just to get its cars prepared for that
race, since they were both damaged in a crash at Nashville Speedway the previous
weekend.
Hildebrand, who won the Firestone Indy Lights race at Kansas Speedway on
April 27, is a rookie in the series this year, but he has special memories of
Mid-Ohio too.
"I've won all four F2000 races that I've been in at Mid-Ohio," he pointed
out. "That was in 2006. I won an SCCA Atlantic race there at the end of
2006 as well. I clinched the F2000 championship at Mid-Ohio by winning the third
race there."
Like most racers who compete here, Hildebrand is a big fan of Mid-Ohio.
"It's an awesome track," he said. "It has good flow. It's really technical.
The way its elevation changes and with the speed variations it has, it's just
a really rhythmic track. It has a lot of grip for a road course. It has a
good mix of everything."
And for drivers like Prendeville and Hildebrand and the crew of
RLR/Andersen Racing, coming to Mid-Ohio is like coming home.