Tuesday, April 28, 1998 | 9:12 a.m.
A gamble by Jimmy Vasser's crew chief paid huge dividends as the Las Vegas resident earned his first CART FedEx Championship Series victory of the season Monday at Nazareth (Pa.) Speedway.
Two other local drivers, Paul Tracy of Las Vegas and Richie Hearn of Henderson, also finished in the top 10 in the rain-delayed round four of the 19-race series. Tracy finished fifth in his Team Kool Green Reynard/Honda and Hearn took 10th in his Budweiser Swift/Ford Cosworth.
While 13 of the 16 race finishers required three or more pit stops, Vasser's Target/Chip Ganassi Racing team elected to make only two, which caused Vasser some nervous moments late in the race.
"We basically had half a tank but the guys who were right behind me ... had full tanks," Vasser, who started fifth, said. "We pitted under green (on lap 165 of 225) and we went a lap and a half down, but the (drivers behind me) were going to have to pit later on.
"If they would have picked up a yellow in that time frame, then I would have ended up just a lap down -- I would have never been able to come back. It was a little bit of a chance but maybe it turned out for the better in track position and it helped us in the end. But I was a little nervous about that."
The victory was the sixth of Vasser's career but his first on a short oval. Although Vasser (1996) and teammate Alex Zanardi (1997) have won the last two CART championships, none of their combined 15 victories over the past two seasons had come on a mile oval. Zanardi finished second Monday.
"I didn't think about that," Vasser said of his team's drought on the short ovals, "but I knew we had a good car because we had a great test. We worked real hard here ... right after Long Beach, to try to get a set-up and we changed our theory 100 percent and the car was great."
Vasser, who earned $100,000 for the win and vaulted from 12th to fifth in the series points battle, said it just was nice to get a win -- no matter the configuration of the track.
"It's just fantastic to win a race and finally get back in a winner's circle and get some points," Vasser said.
Tracy, who officially became a Las Vegas resident today when he and his new wife, Liisa, moved into their Summerlin home, had predicted he would do well after a successful test at Nazareth earlier this month. Fifth place, however, was not what he had in mind.
"It was an OK day," Tracy said. "We need to work on our pit stops some more. We did OK on the track -- we were running the same pace as everybody else -- but the last pit stop was a little slow and cost us a couple of positions out of the pits and it stayed that way.
"The Team Kool Green car was balanced and pretty consistent through the fuel runs. It was just a matter of waiting for a group of traffic to try and make up some spots."
A caution period on lap 207 set up a six-lap dash to the finish -- not enough for Tracy, who started 10th, to gain ground on fourth-place Gil de Ferran or third-place Greg Moore.
Tracy earned 10 points, doubling his season total going into the race. He is 10th in the PPG Cup standings.
Hearn, who qualified 13th for the race, picked up three points for his 10th-place finish -- his first PPG Cup points of the season -- and was the highest finisher among the three drivers running the Swift chassis.
"My car was running fast but it was nearly impossible to pass since the groove is so tight here," Hearn said of Nazareth Speedway. "The track dictates the conditions and, unfortunately, passing is extremely difficult here.
"I'm happy we were able to finish in the points. My Swift Ford handled well. The car stayed the same the whole race for me. On my own, I ran fast but it was a little tricky in traffic."
The CART FedEx Championship Series resumes May 10 with the Rio 400 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
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