FA: Newman Wachs signs A1 winner.

The Newman Wachs Racing team has snapped up Jonathan Summerton to drive the #36 car in this year's Atlantic Championship, which starts at Long Beach this weekend.

Summerton made history last weekend when he took first place in the feature race at Shanghai's A1 Grand Prix round, claiming A1 Team USA's first victory in the World Cup of Motorsport. The F3 graduate finished the race nearly ten seconds in front of Team Portugal, having led from lights to flag. It was not all plain sailing for Summerton, however, as, prior to the start, the 19-year old had to be given an anti-inflammatory treatment to reduce bruising and swelling in his right hand sustained after a start-line incident with New Zealand in the morning's sprint race.

"This win is definitely going to build up team morale and we are going to carry that on to Brands Hatch," Summerton said, "We did our best to just go out there and go for the win. I knew that, basically, Switzerland was going to be our biggest competition, so I had to go out there and go for the win. I just kept pushing once I got by.

"We had a bad start to the weekend, but we had to figure out the problem and work from there. In qualifying, we were still struggling, but managed to put some good times down. For the sprint race, which is a rolling start, we were all going, and I was focused on moving ahead when Johnny Reid came over on me, we touched and that was it, as my front wing was damaged. I managed to get back to the pits, but my race was over. It was an unfortunate incident as we could have definitely been in the top five."