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NorhternLight IRL: Cheever plagued by problems on first day of practice in Atlanta

15 July 2000

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
Hampton, GA - A clutch problem and fuel pump leak restricted track time for #51 Excite@Home driver Eddie Cheever Jr. on the first day of practice for Saturday's seventh round of the Indy Racing Northern Light Series, the Midas 500 Classic at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Cheever, who claimed the first Indy Racing victory for the #51 Excite@Home team and the Infiniti Indy engine at Pikes Peak in June, currently leads the 2000 Indy Racing Northern Light Series standings with 176 points.

Eddie Cheever Jr. (on the first day of practice): "We had a terrible day. We had two problems that would have taken us out of the race. In the first practice we had a clutch problem and lost ten minutes, and in our second session the fuel pump developed a leak with twenty-five minutes remaining. We worked on some qualifying stuff, but we never really had a chance to get up to speed. Hopefully we're getting all of our bugaboos out of the way before the race on Saturday."

Primary Sponsorship of the #51 Indy Car comes from Excite@Home. The company is based in Redwood City, California, at the heart of Silicon Valley. Associate Sponsors of Team Cheever include Infiniti, Firestone, Indy Promotional Products, Menards, Bosch, and Pennzoil.

Excite@Home (Nasdaq: ATHM) is the leading broadband online service provider, offering residential and commercial broadband services worldwide through the Company's 15,000 mile Internet backbone. The company has a global footprint of 87 million broadband homes under long-term contract. Excite@Home offers consumers broadband services over cable-modem, DSL and wireless connections, and businesses high-speed commercial services with Excite representing the consumer content experience and @Home providing access in local markets through broadband connectivity partners. Excite@Home has approximately 13.5 million cable franchise homes under contract outside of North America and localized versions of the Excite service in 10 leading international markets.

Text provided by Ashleigh Higgins

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