http://www.speedtv.com/articles/auto/indycar/34417/

Super Aguri Panther Racing announced today that it has signed 2003
Formula Dream Champion Hideki Mutoh to drive its Indy Pro Series entry
for the 2007 season. This marks Panther Racing’s return to the Indy
Racing League’s developmental series, after the team won a dominant
championship in 2003 with Mark Taylor, who won seven of the 11 races in
which he competed that season.

Mutoh, a 24-year-old from Tokyo, Japan, is a veteran of the Formula
Ford, Formula Dream, Asian Formula 2000 and the Japanese Formula 3
series. Most recently, in 2006, Mutoh competed in both Formula Nippon
and the Super GT Championship, where he started from the pole and won
his final race at Fuji Speedway.

“In addition to Kosuke Matsuura we’re excited to have Hideki Mutoh, who
has lot of experience in some of Japan’s top racing categories, to our
team,” Panther Racing CEO and co-owner John Barnes said. “His addition
will allow us to return to the Indy Pro Series and strengthen our
partnership with Super Aguri. We hope that Hideki adjusts to his new
environment quickly and we look forward to him showing us 100 percent in
the races. We’ve already hired some great people for our IPS program so
he’s going to be in great hands here at Panther. ”

Mutoh will drive the No. 55 entry, with sponsorship details to be
released in the near future.

“I am very excited to race in the Indy Pro Series this year with Super
Aguri Panther Racing,” Mutoh said. “This year, I was racing in Formula
Nippon and Super GT, which are the top categories of Japanese racing. I
am very happy to get this great opportunity but at the same time I am
very nervous to reach my expectations. Everything will be a new
experience for me but I am ready to learn as much as possible and I will
do my best next season.”

Mutoh’s race engineer will be Blair Perschbacher and his chief mechanic
is John Worthe. Like Matsuura, who will drive Panther’s No. 55 Panasonic
Honda in the IndyCar Series next season, Mutoh is part of Aguri Suzuki’s
Super Aguri Indy Project – an initiative that was formed in 2002.

“I am very happy to announce our entry into the Indy Pro Series with
Hideki Mutoh,” Suzuki said. “The series will be racing on the same
courses as the IRL IndyCar Series so it will be a great learning curve
for Mutoh as a freshman to American oval racing. The team itself is
returning to the Indy Pro Series so we hope to learn the series with the
driver and hopefully we can be a top team again soon.”


--
forty

“There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and
mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.” - Ernest Hemingway

forty wrote:


Great news!! Another American short track hero signed in the junior
league of the junior league!! Another true all-American oval racing
star following the IRL vision!!

Cal Vanize wrote:

I always saw a little Shampine in young Mutoh. But Oswego's loss is
the IPS' gain.

scottscottscott wrote:

Isn't Oswego a suburb of Kyoto? [lol]

"scottscottscott" <scottrevision (AT) yahoo (DOT) com> wrote

Did he run at IRP? Winchester ? Knoxville? Maybe Smoke put him a sprint
car at Eldora? That's got to be it.

Just wait all those short track heros will really start coming out of the
woodwork now. Honda will find somewhere to race in a few years after
dumping the IRL. Maybe you will see Accord vs Camary in midgets and sprint
cars in just a couple of years.