Adam Christodoulou regained the lead of the Star Mazda Championship at the Milwaukee Mile with a second-place finish after polesitter Richard Kent was taken out in a first-corner accident.
Christodoulou now holds a 211-207 point lead over Irishman Peter Dempsey, who took fourth and set the fastest lap despite having only previously run two practice sessions on oval tracks.
The Mazdas were running as support for a NASCAR meeting, and disruption to its events caused by heavy rain forced the cancellation of qualifying, with the starting grid set by practice times instead.
Come race day the weather had improved, and the 100 laps of the self-styled “America’s Legendary Oval” took place under cloudless skies.
Kent, handed pole by virtue of his 27.791sec lap from Friday practice, was challenged at the start by third-place qualifier Conor Daly and the pair ended up in the wall.
The lead was inherited by Jorge Goncalvez until lap 27, when Anders Krohn took over and held on to win despite pressure from Dempsey and a late caution and restart which shook up the field.
Christodoulou made the most of the restart and grabbed second, having started the race 12th on the grid.
The Star Mazda Championship will next be in action on July 10 at the Iowa Speedway, where Christodoulou topped the timesheets at a practice session for the series in late May.