Manufacturers: Reynard winning in USA and Japan
22 August 2000
Posted By Terry
Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
Reynard celebrated victories in USA, winning at the Motorola 220 CART
race and taking a win and Championship Title at Twin Ring Motegi in
Japan, venue for the 7th round of the 2000 Formula Nippon Championship.
Toranosuke Takagi, driving the Reynard 2KL for PIAA Nakajima team,
captured his 4th consecutive win and 6th of the season, with a pole to
finish drive, helping him to earn the title of 2000 Series Champion,
with four rounds of the Championship still to come. This weekend's
victory was Takagi's 9th in Formula Nippon and his 12th overall
including the F3000 era. It is also Takagi's first Series Champion
Title. It is the 7th consecutive team victory for Reynard team, PIAA
NAKAJIMA, almost assuring them the Team Title during the next race.
In the USA, Paul Tracy driving the Team Green Honda Reynard brought victory for Reynard Motorsport, at this weekend's round of the FedEx Championship Series at Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin. A 2nd place finish for Fernandez , 7.450 seconds behind Tracy, in Patrick Racing's Ford Reynard and 3rd place for Kenny Brack, Team Rahal Ford Reynard, completed the trophy spots to give Reynard another podium sweep.
Paul Tracy, Team KOOL Green Honda Reynard: "I don't know how we were able to do that today. On the first lap, things were looking good and then I came out of Turn 2 and the thing just shut off. I'm amazed nobody hit me. The guys figured out that it was a bad throttle sensor, and I had to reset everything, which took about 30 or 40 seconds. By the time we got it figured out I was all by myself. I slid around for the first half a lap. Then Barry [Green, team owner] came on and motivated me. He said, 'Just run it like qualifying. Just go as hard as you can go for as long as you can go.' I can't explain it. I didn't get angry, didn't get frustrated, I just got into the zone. It's always satisfying to win, but today was one of the most satisfying. Wins that come when you really do it with everything stacked against you, it's that much sweeter. We've definitely got a shot at the championship. We've had a lot of bad luck and most people would have given up, but we're not ready to give up yet."
Adrian Fernandez, Patrick Racing Ford Reynard: "At the start, I knew it was going to be interesting. I was right in the gearbox of [Alex] Tagliani and I had to go half-throttle to keep from hitting him. Then, going into Turn 3, I had Helio [Castroneves] on the outside. I think Helio went off there. Then, I went after Michael [Andretti] and when I got by him, I was up to third. Then, after that, the race was pretty good. Then I came to lap Oriol Servia when I was battling Paul. He was holding me up for a few laps and Paul got past me. I knew Kenny was coming hard and Jimmy Vasser, but I managed to extend my gap, and then we decided not to change tires on our last pit stop. I think if you finish in the top five in rest of the races you've got a good shot at the championship. There's so many things that can happen, but if you stay in the top five, good shot."
Kenny Brack, Team Rahal, Ford Reynard: "I think we've done well. We were sixth in Portland and second in Cleveland, so I think we've done better on the road courses than the ovals this year. I almost hit Paul at the start, and then I saw the other Team KOOL Green car go off later on. I tried to give Paul a harder time towards the end, but he was strong. We did a good job going from ninth to third today. We haven't seen the upcoming courses so it's hard to say what's going to happen. If you judge by the previous courses we haven't seen, we've done pretty well. We've been very, very close, but haven't gotten to the line first yet. That's still my goal, but I think we can stay in the championship."
Text provided by Alison Hill
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