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CART: Changes made in test and tire supply rules for 2000 season

10 December 1999

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
Championship Auto Racing Teams announced this week changes in testing and tire supply rules for the 2000 season.

Under the changes that were approved by CART's Franchise Board on Dec. 2, each one-car team will be allotted 20 total days of testing from the end of the season blackout in 1999 (Dec. 3) through the final race of the 2000 season (Oct. 29). This total includes 12 days of out-of-season testing, six in-season testing days and two optional test days either in- or out-of-season.

Two-car teams will be allotted a total of 28 days of testing under the new guidelines. This includes 16 out-of-season testing days, eight days in-season and four optional test days.

It also represents a decrease of approximately 14 percent in the amount of total test days initially announced by CART for 2000 in mid October and a 44 percent decrease from the total testing days allotted during the 1999 season (50 for a two-car team).

"This change in our testing rules demonstrates the Franchise Board's resolution to take care of our participants quality of life and reducing the overall cost of competition while maintaining the competitive atmosphere that characterizes the CART FedEx Championship Series," said Tim Mayer, CART Senior Vice President for Racing Operations.

CART also altered tire supply rules for the coming season, modifying the number of sets of tires available to teams at superspeedways from 15 to 12 sets, and defining the specific tire sets available for each entrant in open tests, Spring Training and individual team testing.

"We have worked in close cooperation with Firestone to produce a set of regulations that will allow the company to guarantee the same high quality of service, performance and competition that we have seen Firestone tires produce in past years, ," said J. Kirk Russell, CART Vice President of Competition. "These rules provide both Firestone and our competitors with a framework with which to plan their testing and competition needs."

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