Joel Miller retook the points lead with a 3rd place in race 2 (photo: Eric McCombs/Star Mazda)

Joel Miller finished 3rd in round 5 of the Star Mazda Championship at Portland International Raceway Sunday to regain the championship points lead by 5 points.  The MAZDASPEED young development driver got off to a rough start in Saturday's race as he was crashed into at the start. The JDC Motorsports team was able to repair the car's front corner which allowed Miller to finish. With this effort, he was able to salvage valuable points in the championship.

Miller qualified 6th for the second race of the double header weekend and fell in line at the start. However, another incident happened in front of his #20 MAZDASPEED/K&N Filters/Mockett/JDC Motorsports car which made him take to the dirt to avoid contact.  He came out in 4th but over 10 seconds down from 3rd place.  Miller ran consistent laps the whole race to close the gap, along with some help from lap traffic.  With 6 laps to go Joel passed Charles Hall for 3rd spot and held that position until the checkered.  With the remarkable pit effort from the JDC crew on Saturday, and Miller's 3rd place finish Sunday, he comes away from the weekend leading the championship by 5 points.

Joel before race 1 (photo Eric McCombs/Star Mazda)

Miller quotes after the weekend, "I wanted to reward my crew by getting on the podium.  Rick Cameron, my engineer, was coaching me the whole race telling me I was catching 3rd so I kept putting together consistent laps." In the first 5 races of the season Miller has been able to finish on the podium 4 out of 5 times: "Consistency will win the championship, and with this 3rd place finish today it gives my team great momentum for the month of August to continue with our consistency" commented Miller.

Joel would like to especially thank Larry Rochelle from Classic Stone for attending this weekends activities. Also, he would like to thank MAZDA, K&N Air Filters, MOCKETT, Classic Stone, DreamCars Automotive, as well as John, Scott Church and Rick Cameron from JDC Motorsports. The next round of the Star Mazda Championship will be held on the weekend of August 10th at Road America in Elkhart Lake, WI.