Raphael Matos

Raphael Matos
Raphael Matos at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on the first day of qualifying for the 2011 500
Nationality	Brazilian
Born	(1981-08-28) August 28, 1981 Belo Horizonte, Brazil
IndyCar Series career
Debut season	2009
Current team	AFS Racing
Racing licence	FIA Gold
Car number	17
Former teams	de Ferran Dragon Racing
Starts	34
Wins	0
Poles	0
Best finish	13th in 2009
Previous series
2008 2006-2007 2004-2005 2002-2003	Firestone Indy Lights Champ Car Atlantic Series A1 Grand Prix Star Mazda Series Skip Barber Formula Dodge Series
Championship titles
2008 2007 2005 2003	Firestone Indy Lights Series Champ Car Atlantic Series Star Mazda Series Skip Barber Formula Dodge
Awards
2009	IndyCar Series Rookie of the Year

Raphael Matos (born August 28, 1981) is a Brazilian professional racing driver. He was the 2008 Firestone Indy Lights Series champion and the 2007 Champ Car Atlantic Series champion. He lives in Miami. He is sometimes also called Rafa Matos.

Career highlights

Early career

Born in Belo Horizonte, Matos came to the United States in 2002 after karting in Brazil and began competing in Skip Barber Formula Dodge, winning the championship in 2003. In 2004, he moved up to the Star Mazda Series and in 2005 he won the Star Mazda championship. In 2006 he moved up the Champ Car Atlantic Championship Series where he drove for the Sierra Sierra team and captured one victory on his way to 4th place in the points standings.

Matos celebrating an Atlantics victory in Houston in 2007

He also competed in 4 Indy Pro Series races for Guthrie Racing and swept the two races held in March at St. Petersburg, Florida. During the fall he was named a driver for A1 Team Brazil in the A1 Grand Prix series and made his debut at the series' race in Beijing in the 2006–2007 season. He raced a Lola B07/40-Mazda in the 2007 12 Hours of Sebring and the 2007 Petit Le Mans.

Matos driving in the 2008 Firestone Freedom 100

Atlantics championship and Indy Lights

Matos continued with the Sierra Sierra team in Atlantics in 2007 and clinched the championship with several races remaining in the season, securing for himself the $2 million "scholarship" for a ride in Champ Car for the 2008 season.

However, Matos decided to pass on the scholarship and sign with Andretti Green Racing to drive in the Indy Racing League's Firestone Indy Lights Series in 2008, where he won the series championship.

Prior to the 2008 Indy Lights season, he drove a Mazda RX-8 for the SpeedSource team in the Rolex 24 at Daytona, taking first in the GT class and a 9th place overall finish, sharing the car with Nick Ham, David Haskell and Sylvain Tremblay. After the season, he drove for Michael Shank Racing on the winning team in the DP class (with Ian James and John Pew) at the SunRichGourmet.com 1000 at Miller Motorsports Park.

IndyCar Series

Matos driving in the 2009 Indianapolis 500

Matos competed in the full 2009 IndyCar Series season for Luczo-Dragon Racing. He qualified third in his second race, the Long Beach Grand Prix and finished eight. He was the fastest rookie qualifier in his first Indy 500 and ran in the lead pack, but had a crash with Vítor Meira in which Meira was injured. Matos finished 22nd. Matos captured seasonal Rookie of the Year honors by a wide margin over former F1 driver Robert Doornbos. Matos' best finish was 6th at the Milwaukee Mile. He was running at the finish of each of the last ten races of the season, consistency that led to 13th in the championship despite few top ten finishes. Raphael qualified 12th in both the 2009 and 2010 Indy 500 and he also crashed in both races in roughly the same location at the exit of turn 1. He failed to qualify the AFS entry for the 2011 Indianapolis 500. He was also the fastest Rookie during the 2009 Indy 500 qualifying.

After IndyCar

Matos raced full-time in Stock Car Brasil between 2013 and 2015, claiming a race win in 2014, and a best of 13th overall in 2015. At the end of 2015, he failed a drug test, and was suspended for two years. Matos claimed that he used the undisclosed substance in question in order to treat several tumors he had since he was 18.

In 2018, Matos started racing in the Trans-Am Series, and won the TA2 class championship at his first attempt. He won the class championship again in 2021, after finishing in first place in six out of twelve races.

On August 30, 2024, it was announced that Matos would attempt to make his NASCAR Xfinity Series debut at Watkins Glen International, driving the No. 87 Chevrolet for Jordan Anderson Racing in collaboration with Peterson Racing Group, but several days later, it was revealed that Matos would not make his debut due to being unable to come to a mutual agreement with the team. He would be replaced by Mike Skeen.

Motorsports career results

American Le Mans Series

American Le Mans Series results
Year	Entrant	Class	Chassis	Engine	Tyres	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	Rank	Points
2006	B-K Motorsports	LMP2	Courage C65	Mazda R20B 2.0L 3-rotor	G	SEB ovr:Ret cls:Ret	TEX	MID	LIM	UTA	POR	AME	MOS	PET	MON			23rd	14
2007	B-K Motorsports Mazdaspeed	LMP2	Lola B07/46	Mazda MZR-R 2.0L Turbo I4	K	SEB ovr:NC cls:NC	STP	LNB	TEX	UTA	LIM	MID	AME	MOS	DET	PET ovr:Ret cls:Ret	MON	28th	10
2008	B-K Motorsports	LMP2	Lola B07/46	Mazda MZR-R 2.0 L Turbo I4 (E85 ethanol)	Y	SEB ovr:DNS cls:DNS	STP	LNB	UTA	LIM								33rd	10
			Lola B08/86		D											MON ovr:30 cls:10
	Andretti Green Racing		Acura ARX-01b	Acura 3.4L V8	M						MID ovr:14 cls:7	AME	MOS	DET	PET
2011	Risi Competizione	GT	Ferrari 458 Italia GTC	Ferrari 4.5 L V8	M	SEB	LNB	LIM	MOS	MID	AME	BAL	MON	PET ovr:DNS cls:DNS				NC	-
2012	Performance Tech Motorsports	PC	Oreca FLM09	Chevrolet LS3 6.2 L V8	M	SEB ovr:49 cls:6	LNB	MON	LIM	MOS	MID	AME	BAL ovr:Ret cls:Ret	VIR	PET			28th	10

A1 Grand Prix

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

A1 Grand Prix results
Year	Entrant	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	DC	Points
2006–07	Brazil	NED SPR	NED FEA	CZE SPR	CZE FEA	BEI SPR 6	BEI FEA 7	MYS SPR 19	MYS FEA 18	IDN SPR	IDN FEA	NZL SPR 16	NZL FEA 14	AUS SPR	AUS FEA	RSA SPR	RSA FEA	MEX SPR	MEX FEA	SHA SPR	SHA FEA	GBR SPR	GBR SPR	18th	9

American open–wheel racing

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Atlantic Championship

Year	Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	Rank	Points
2006	Sierra Sierra Enterprises	LBH 2	HOU 11	MTY 23	POR 6	CLE1 5	CLE2 Ret	TOR 9	EDM Ret	SJO 1	DEN 2	MTL 7	ROA 2	4th	205
2007	Sierra Sierra Enterprises	LVG 1	LBH 1	HOU 1	POR1 4	POR2 6	CLE 1	MTT 2	TOR 3	EDM1 1	EDM2 1	SJO 4	ROA 2	1st	341

Indy Lights

Year	Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	Rank	Points
2006	Guthrie Racing	HMS	STP1 1	STP2 1	INDY	WGL 13	IMS 4	NSH	MIL	KTY	SNM1	SNM2	CHI					10th	154
2008	AGR-AFS Racing	HMS 8	STP1 1	STP2 12	KAN 19	INDY 10	MIL 3	IOW 7	WGL1 1	WGL2 2	NSH 5	MDO1 1	MDO2 18	KTY 6	SNM1 2	SNM2 6	CHI 3	1st	510

IndyCar Series

IndyCar Series results
Year	Team	Chassis	No.	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	Rank	Points	Ref
2009	Luczo Dragon Racing	Dallara IR-05	2	Honda HI7R V8	STP 20	LBH 8	KAN 20	INDY 22	MIL 6	TXS 12	IOW 16	RIR 8	WGL 12	TOR 10	EDM 18	KTY 16	MDO 9	SNM 9	CHI 9	MOT 9	HMS 14		13th	312
2010	de Ferran Dragon Racing				SAO 4	STP 8	ALA 14	LBH 20	KAN 16	INDY 29	TXS 16	IOW 14	WGL 4	TOR 21	EDM 13	MDO 7	SNM 21	CHI 29	KTY 16	MOT 18	HMS 17		14th	290
2011	AFS Racing		17		STP 7	ALA 20	LBH 11	SAO 25	INDY DNQ	TXS1	TXS2	MIL	IOW	TOR	EDM	MDO	NHM	SNM	BAL	MOT	KTY	LSV	30th	67

Years	Teams	Races	Poles	Wins	Podiums (Non-win)	Top 10s (Non-podium)	Indianapolis 500 Wins	Championships
3	2	38	0	0	0	13	0	0

Indianapolis 500

Year	Chassis	Engine	Start	Finish	Team
2009	Dallara	Honda	12	22	Luczo Dragon Racing
2010	Dallara	Honda	12	29	de Ferran Dragon Racing
2011	Dallara	Honda	DNQ		AFS Racing

Stock Car Brasil

Stock Car Brasil results
Year	Team	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	Rank	Points
2012	RC3 Bassani	Peugeot 408	INT	CTB	VEL	RBP	LON	RIO	SAL	CAS	TAR	CTB	BSB 23	INT 9										NC†	0†
2013	Bardahl Hot Car	Chevrolet Sonic	INT 10	CUR 26	TAR 16	SAL 26	BRA 10	CAS 19	RBP 6	CAS 8	VEL 16	CUR 18	BRA 10	INT 18										13th	84
2014	Bardahl Hot Car	Chevrolet Sonic	INT 1 17	SCZ 1 7	SCZ 2 23	BRA 1 2	BRA 2 26	GOI 1 17	GOI 2 Ret	GOI 1 DSQ	CAS 1 Ret	CAS 2 27	CUR 1 22	CUR 2 12	VEL 1 Ret	VEL 2 Ret	SCZ 1 10	SCZ 2 1	TAR 1 15	TAR 2 8	SAL 1 10	SAL 2 2	BRA 1 Ret	16th	104

† Ineligible for championship points.

• Season still in progress

External links

• Official website
• Raphael Matos driver statistics at Racing-Reference
• IndyCar Driver Page
• Champ Car Atlantic Series bio