CART: Texaco Grand Prix of Houston Notes and Quotes
25 September 1999
Posted By Terry
Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
JUAN MONTOYA, Target Honda Reynard: "When we went out this
morning, the car felt pretty good, then the track started coming in, and
we
changed the car and changed the car and changed the car and it didn't get
any better. We finally got going in the right direction late in
qualifying,
so I'm pretty happy. It's pretty difficult to clinch the championship this
weekend. I need to get some points, and I need to finish in front of Dario
[Franchitti]. That's the most important thing. I'm just going to go for
it.
My goal is to get good points and finish ahead of Dario, then maybe change
my mentality when we go to Australia."
CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI, Big Kmart Ford Swift: "This morning, obviously, I had to start a little slower and go from there. I was a little bit rusty and I had to shave a little here and there. Obviously, the track was better in the second session, but not more than two or three tenths [of a second]. Hopefully, we can improve for tomorrow and fight with these two guys and the others for the pole. I realize I was a little lucky in St. Louis, but it went the way it went, and I'm happy to be back in the car."
BRYAN HERTA, Shell Ford Reynard: "This morning was pretty uneventful, nothing dramatic. I made a couple of improvements to the car and it was quite good for qualifying. I'm pretty pleased. The track got better and I think the car will be better tomorrow. I wanted to give myself a good spot [today], but tomorrow will be the important day for qualifying. Lap time is just a relative number. I don't really care what it is as long as we have the lowest one. We've got the car working better. We kind of lost our way this year; we lost our confidence, and when that happens, it's hard to find your way back, so we said, 'Let's go back to ground zero, to what we know will work,' and now we've gotten it turned around."
WHAT'S NOTEWORTHY
* Juan Montoya (Target Honda Reynard) will be chasing his seventh pole of the season when final qualifying gets under way at 1:45 p.m. ET Saturday. His previous poles have come at Nazareth, Gateway, Portland, Cleveland, Detroit, and Vancouver.
* Montoya's poles at Cleveland, Detroit and Vancouver give him pole positions at three of the five temporary street circuits contested thus far in this year's FedEx Championship Series. Other temporary street circuit poles have been won by Tony Kanaan (McDonald's Championship Racing Team Honda Reynard) at Long Beach and Gil de Ferran (Valvoline/Cummins Special Honda Reynard) at Toronto.
* Christian Fittipaldi (Big Kmart Ford Swift) is seeking his second front-row start of the season. Fittipaldi won his first FedEx Championship Series career pole position at Rio de Janeiro in May.
* Bryan Herta (Shell Ford Reynard) has made three top three-starts this season: third at Long Beach, second at Mid-Ohio and the pole at Laguna Seca.
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