CART: Another pole, another podium for Reynard
25 July 2000
Posted By Terry CallahanMotorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
This weekend's Michigan 500 Champ Car race at the Michigan Superspeedway produced one of the most exciting races of the Championship so far this year. With 55 changes of lead, over 10 different race leaders and only four thousandths of a second separating the first two drivers over the line, the close racing delighted CART fans.
Reynard driver, Paul Tracy, piloting the Team KOOL Green Reynard 2Ki Honda, qualified in pole position alongside defending CART Champion, Juan Montoya. After 250 laps of the 2 mile oval, Montoya took the win for Target Ganassi Racing, with Michael Andretti, Newman Haas Racing, in second place and Dario Franchitti, keeping Reynard on the podium with a third place finish in his Team KOOL Green Reynard Honda.
Franchitti said after the race, ""To start with, the car was pretty evil, but on each stop we were making the car a little better. Unfortunately, at the end I didn't have quite enough for these guys. I had a good battle with Max [Papis] and I don't know what happened. He blew an engine or something. It was a bit Mickey Mouse racing a little bit with everybody saving fuel, but it was good at the end. I'm pretty happy with my finish after the way it started today. I thought we'd be a couple laps down. Pretty much anything would help me in the points, because this is only the second time I've been on the podium this year. But as we showed last year, it's not over until the last lap of the last race. Hopefully, it will be that close again this year, only with me one point ahead this time around. [On the finish] It was pretty close. Michael was close to Juan, Juan was close to the wall, and Marques was close to both of them. I was behind both of them [Montoya and Andretti] when they crashed last year at Japan. But they both had the best cars today and they deserved to be up there at the end."
The Reynard 2KQ was also out on track in the USA this weekend, with the two Reynard cars of Johansson Matthews Racing contesting the Grand Prix of Sonoma at Sears Point Raceway. Qualifying 7th and 10th, the sister cars were strong throughout practice and qualifying. In the race, the cars were classified 7th and 10th in class, with the No. 36 car of Stefan Johansson and Guy Smith, running amongst the leading cars for the majority of the 3 hour race, but slowing at the end with mechanical problems to lose 6th place in the closing minutes of the event.
Text provided by Alison Hill
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