Photo credit: Gavin Baker Photography

Between the USF Juniors and USF2000 races on Saturday at NOLA Motorsports Park, over 40 drivers from different racing backgrounds took part. Despite this, neither of the two lowest rungs of the USF Pro Championships had a single caution flag thrown.

This is especially impressive in USF Juniors, a series that had numerous drivers inexperienced in car racing who were moving up from karting and a record field of 25 cars partaking in the first race of the season.

Completing races with young drivers running green flag from start to finish not only speaks to the quality of the racecraft of the drivers who are coming through the system but also the environment that the USF Pro Championships fosters.

The drivers are able to learn how to race each other competitively, which also doesn’t come at a cost to the ability for each driver to make it through the race.

There’s many potential reasons why the racing has been able to be clean. One that stands out is the availability and comprehensiveness of testing programs is greater for drivers in the series than ever before. 

The growing popularity of the YACademy Winter Series has given USF Juniors drivers arguably the best simulation of a real race weekend possible. 

Competitors there have the chance to compete in USF Juniors cars against USF Juniors competition a month before the season starts to get acclimatized to what they will go up against as early as possible. YACademy also provides test days for drivers in all three USF Pro Championships series to be able to take advantage of.

The USF Pro Championships also features the unique and highly-touted scholarship system which allows for drivers to progress all the way from the affiliated Skip Barber Race Series to funding necessary to compete in IndyCar. With a prize package of hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line unlike other junior series around the world, drivers are doing what they can in order to keep themselves in the running.

With all of this in mind, USF Juniors and USF2000 have created a system that maximizes seat time for developing racing drivers across the country. With loads of testing opportunities available for competitors and the incentives of securing your future with scholarships, all three levels of the series have seen unparalleled growth, and for good reason.

Looking at USF Juniors in particular as it kicks off its third year, fields sitting at or just above 10 cars were the norm. As the Tatuus JR-23 package that the series runs on became more available and the scholarship system continued to look more appealing, entries grew and grew.

The Tatuus JR-23 package in particular brings up one more point regarding how the USF Pro Championships facilities clean racing across all of their levels. Replicability. The cars are very similar across the three levels and drivers who compete in USF Juniors have said they are immediately competitive and comfortable when taking the next step.

Seat time. Comfort. Incentives. All of those are things that lead to clean racing, and all of those are things the USF Pro Championships is currently nailing on the head in 2024.