#10 Kanaan CART Mexico City Friday Provisional Qualifying

MEXICO CITY (Friday, Nov. 15, 2002) -- Tony Kanaan and the #10 Pioneer-WorldCom/Mo Nunn Racing Honda-Lola are fifth on the provisional grid for Sunday's Gran Premio Telmex/Gigante after first-round qualifying this afternoon at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.  Kanaan recorded a fast lap of 1 minute, 26.719 seconds (115.656 mph) around the 2.747-mile permanent road course on his last allotted qualifying lap of the day to move him up two spots in the order.  Kanaan was forced to his backup Pioneer-WorldCom Honda for the second time today after encountering gearbox problems in his primary car during the 10-minute warm-up session prior to the qualifying laps.  The primary car encountered similar problems and ran only a limited number of laps during this morning's 90-minute practice session. 
 

Bruno Junqueira earned the provisional pole today with a fast lap of 1:25.941 (116.703 mph).  He'll start no worse than second on Sunday and he picked up a point in the championship standings.  Christian Fittipaldi was second in 1:26.027 (116.587 mph), followed by Dario Franchitti in third at 1:26.147 (116.424 mph).

 

Practice continues Saturday morning with final qualifying set for 1:45 p.m. local time (2:45 p.m. EST).  SPEED Channel's tape-delayed 90-minute final qualifying show begins at 3:30 p.m. EST.  Race time Sunday is 3 p.m. local time (4 p.m. EST) with SPEED Channel's live coverage beginning with a pre-race show at 3:30 p.m. EST.

 

TONY KANAAN QUOTES

 

"After starting in the top three (including twice on the pole) at the last three races, fifth doesn't feel all too good right now.  Especially since we've been having the problems we've had so far today.  I had to go to my backup car twice.  That's very disruptive, to begin with.  And the primary car is the one I felt more comfortable in during the limited time it was running well.  But if you're going to have those kinds of problems, Friday is probably the best day to have them.  My guys will work on sorting things out for tomorrow and I'm confident we can move up on the grid.  I love this racetrack.  You're going to see a great show here on Sunday."