Ilott had two top-10 finishes as well, finishing 20th in points.
“Everybody asked me who is this kid,” Juncos said of Ilott. “Six races later, half of 2022, all the top teams want to hire him, so I guess I have better eyes than some of them. I think it was perfect for him because he has no pressure to come into a young team that is developing. We know we cannot give him a winning car yet and we are working together to be that winning team.”
Juncos started firming up his 2023 plans shortly before the final stretch of last season. He began by signing Ilott to a multi-year contract extension. A few months later, Juncos announced he had signed multi-time Argentinian touring car champion Agustin Canapino to partner Ilott for the full season.
Ilott’s fifth-place finish in the season-opening IndyCar race on the streets of St. Petersburg was a long time coming for a team that started life as a karting squad more than 20 years ago.
Juncos came to the U.S. in 2002 after the Argentinian economy collapsed. After working for a short time as a team manager for a karting team, Juncos founded his own karting operation named Juncos Competition. Sebastian Ordonez won almost immediately for the team, providing an influx of drivers willing to pay to learn and sharpen their skills behind the wheel.
The team moved to the Road to Indy in 2009 to compete in what was then known as the Star Mazda Championship. Conor Daly won the title in 2010 for the renamed Juncos Racing and put the team firmly on the map. Spencer Pigot won the rebranded Pro Mazda title for the team in 2014 and claimed the Indy Lights crown in 2015.
Juncos began looking at what the next move for his organization was going to be.
After KV Racing ceased operations following the 2016 IndyCar season, Juncos saw an opportunity to purchase the team’s cars and equipment to enter the 2017 Indianapolis 500. The team entered two cars as Sebastian Saavedra joined Pigot in the team’s first IndyCar Series race.
Juncos Racing entered 12 IndyCar events the following season with 2017 Indy Lights champion Kyle Kaiser, Force India Formula 1 test driver Alfonso Celis Jr. and Formula Renault race winner Rene Binder sharing the driving duties.
Ahead of the 2019 racing season, Juncos shifted his team’s focus to IMSA, running a Cadillac DPi with a handful of drivers, while also fielding two cars in Indy Lights and Indy Pro 2000. After Victor Franzoni’s accident at the IMSA round at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in July, Juncos backed away from IMSA, running the season-ending race at Road Atlanta as a farewell to big-league sports car racing.
“That was the biggest mistake that I’ve ever made,” Juncos said of his IMSA venture. “I put the whole company in danger. We collapsed it and we spent a lot of money in a product that is so hard to find the drivers.
“Because it’s four drivers sharing a car or three drivers, no one is happy with the car because everybody drives different. So now as a driver you always drive it in a gray area. That is something you never like, but it is what it is.”
Juncos lost between 40 and 50 percent of his initial investment in IMSA, eventually selling the Cadillac to Chip Ganassi in late 2020, which provided the team with a much-needed cash boost ahead of the 2021 racing season.
After partnering with Hollinger, Juncos Hollinger Racing attempted to qualify two cars for the Indianapolis 500 for the first time since 2017.
And all of it was thanks to a pair of VIP passes.
This story appeared in the June 7, 2023 edition of the SPEED SPORT Insider.
