Carpentier wins, ends da Matta's CART streak

July 14, 2002 The AP reported that Patrick Carpentier finally had a fairly uneventful trip around the race track. And a winning one.

Carpentier, beset by mechanical problems last week in Toronto, finally got some luck and his second career victory, winning the Marconi Grand Prix of Cleveland on Sunday to end Cristiano da Matta's CART winning streak at four races.

"For once, we had everything going our way," said Carpentier, who took the lead on Lap 49 when defending champion Dario Franchitti broke down. "We had no problems, zero problems. My team gave me a perfect car."

Carpentier, who blew an engine during Saturday's practice session, won by 17.059 seconds over Michael Andretti, and 28.295 seconds over Paul Tracy.

Kenny Brack was fourth, and Alex Tagliani fifth in the 18-car starting field, quickly reduced to 16 following a four-car pileup on the first turn.

Carpentier averaged 120.998 mph over the 115-lap race -- Cleveland's longest since 1983 -- on the temporary 2.106-mile Burke Lakefront Airport course.

Da Matta has dominated the circuit all season, and was seeking a record fifth straight win. But the Brazilian was done after just 21 laps because of an electrical problem in his engine.

"It's a huge shame," da Matta said. "What happened was just one of those things in racing. I'm not disappointed about not setting a new record. The streak doesn't mean anything to me. The championship is my goal."

The 30-year-old Carpentier, whose best finish this season had been fourth at Japan in April, won for the first time since the Michigan 500 last season.

That victory came on an oval track. Now Carpentier, one of the better road racers on the circuit, has a road course victory, too.

"I'm more happy to get this one," he said. "Getting the second one was tough."

Carpentier's surprising win came a week after a 10th-place finish at Molson-Indy in Toronto for the Canadian, who doesn't have a contract for next season.

"Last week, we had a problem every 10 to 15 minutes," he said. "We had a problem in every qualifying session, the practices, everything. This weekend, everything was perfect. It was completely the opposite of Toronto."

However, he did have an early problem as his dashboard electrical system malfunctioned and he was unable to gauge how his car was performing.

He was able to take care of the problem, and soon after got another break when da Matta, the pole sitter and overwhelming favorite, went out.

"Man," Carpentier said, joking. "I was so disappointed you couldn't believe it."

For the first 20 laps, the 28-year-old da Matta, who won two bonus points this weekend during qualifying to raise his series total to 120, looked to be on his way to making history.

Da Matta had built a 2.3-second lead over Franchitti, and his No. 6 Toyota-powered Lola seemed to be stampeding toward another win when he unexpectedly pitted, telling his crew over the on-board radio that he didn't know what was wrong.

"The car started losing power," he said.

After getting fuel and new tires, da Matta returned to the track, but it wasn't long before his streak went up in a puff of grayish-blue exhaust smoke on the back straightaway.

"I'll be honest with you," Carpentier said. "If he didn't break down, he would have been really tough to catch. He was pulling away with every lap."

Until he can put another string of wins together, da Matta will have to share the CART record of four consecutive victories with Al Unser Jr. (1990) and Alex Zanardi (1998).

Despite his early exit, da Matta leads the standings through eight races with 120 points -- 50 more than Bruno Junqueira, and 56 more than Franchitti.

Da Matta's lead is so big that he could miss the next two events and still be the championship leader.

But at 39, Andretti, the oldest active driver on the circuit, insists the trophy shouldn't be engraved just yet.

"He could have four of those in a row," Andretti said, "and all of a sudden it's a new ballgame. You can't get too confident because things can turn around really fast."