IRL Longhorn 500 Preview
9 June 1999
TEAM MENARD SETS UP CAMP AT TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY IN SEARCH OF FIRST WIN WITH HOMETOWNER GREG RAY FORT WORTH - If blackjack, or numerology, is the name of the game, Greg Ray's three consecutive 21s in Pep Boys Indy Racing League action this season might be worth something. But the reality of the situation is that 21st place is a long way from where most everyone might have expected to see Ray and his lightning-quick #2 Glidden-Menards Dallara/Aurora/Firestone entry of Team Menard place after his runs at Orlando, Phoenix and Indianapolis. "I don't know if I should go to Las Vegas and play blackjack or just stay racing," said Ray, the 32-year-old from nearby Plano, Texas, who joined Team Menard this past offseason and comes to his hometown track for this weekend's (June 10-12) running of the Longhorn 500 at Texas Motor Speedway. "It's been a bit frustrating this year because we've been so fast but haven't been able to accomplish what we wanted to do. We're so capable. But to have the results we've had is pathetic. I know we can do it. I hate talking about it. But I know we can do it." Team Menard is coming off a heartbreaking run at last month's Indianapolis 500, where Ray qualified in the middle of the front row and was running in and out of the lead before a freak accident on pit road ended his day early. A second Team Menard car driven by CART FedEx Championship Series regular Robby Gordon then mounted a serious charge to victory, only to see that bid end on the next-to-last lap when Gordon ran out of fuel while leading. "It's been one of those seasons so far, but I've got to say our run at Indy with Robby was one of the funnest times I've had at The Brickyard in 20 years," said team owner John Menard. "We've been so focused on winning Indy, and having come so close to winning, I think we're ready to just let loose at Texas and see what happens. It's always an eventful race." Ray had quite an eventful run at TMS last season, dueling fellow Texas Billy Boat down to the checkered flag before settling for a second-place finish. "The whole race was fast and furious - flat-out the whole time," said Ray, who drove the Thomas Knapp Motorsports entry in last year's event here. "The in-car camera footage showed the nose of my car under Billy's gearbox. It was lap after lap of that. We had a good car. I thought we could have won, but we needed more traffic. I had a lot of friends and family in the stands. There was a lot of commotion in the stands on Lap 200 because a lot of people thought the race was 200 laps, and I was leading at 200 laps." This year, Ray hopes to not only be leading on Lap 200, but on Lap 208, when the checkered flag falls. And, with no finishes to his credit this season, he knows it'll take plenty more of the same in the season's final seven events. "It would be incredible to win here," Ray said. "This track has been very good to me. When I drive to the racetrack, people recognize me here. People wave at me, honk at me. I'm not the Dallas Cowboys, but I'm the local racer. We have the Stars, the Rangers, the Cowboys and Greg Ray. I really feel like that. To win here would be a storybook story. "After Orlando and after Phoenix, where I was just trying to be Mr. Consistent, we threw away that philosophy going into Charlotte. We have to win and win in a hurry. We're in desperation mode as far as the championship is concerned. We have the potential of winning every time we're at the racetrack. We just have to capitalize on it and prove to everyone that we can do it." Practice and qualifying for the Longhorn 500 are set for Thursday (June 10) afternoon and evening, respectively. Practice resumes on Friday (June 11). The green flag falls for the 500-kilometer event at 6:30 p.m. CDT on Saturday (June 12).