Long Beach notes: Move to Las Vegas good for Tagliani

Monday, April 17, 2000 | 10:34 a.m.

LONG BEACH, Calif. -- CART rookie Alex Tagliani, who drives the No. 33 Reynard/Ford Cosworth for Player's Forsythe Racing, recently joined Player's teammate Patrick Carpentier in moving to Las Vegas.

The change of scenery from his native Quebec obviously has agreed with the 27-year-old Tagliani, whose fourth-place finish in Sunday's Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach was his second points-paying showing in as many races.

"I'm happy with the results," said Tagliani, who opened the season with a ninth-place showing at Homestead-Miami Speedway. "This was a fun race and even though it's hard to pass here, I managed to make quite a few of them.

"I wanted a podium finish for the Player's team ... but with five laps to go, I started to have brake problems because I was working them a lot, with all that traffic around me. But I'm still a rookie ... and I will have more opportunities to make it to the podium."

Tagliani is the fourth CART driver to move to Las Vegas since the opening of Las Vegas Motor Speedway in 1996; Jimmy Vasser, Paul Tracy and Carpentier are the others.

Richie Hearn, who lost his ride with Della Penna Motorsports prior to the start of the season, continues to reside in Henderson.

Carpentier sat out this weekend after fracturing his wrist in a fall at his Summerlin home last week.

* FITTIPALDI'S SCARE: Newman/Haas driver Christian Fittipaldi had a close call Sunday when his Lola/Ford Cosworth caught fire during a pit stop on lap 48.

Fittipaldi jumped out of his burning car, landed awkwardly and twisted his left ankle, and had to be carried over the pit wall by his teammates.

"I'm OK," Fittipaldi said later. "I just fell and twisted it a bit."

* RIBBS' MISSION: Former CART driver Willy T. Ribbs is teaming with the Derek Daly Performance Driving Academy at Las Vegas Motor Speedway to start a defensive and performance driving program for professional athletes.

Inspired by the death of Charlotte Hornets player Bobby Phills in an automobile accident earlier this year, Ribbs said the goal of the Athlete Protection Program is not to teach athletes how to drive faster, but how to prevent accidents.

* CART GOING TO MEXICO: Monterrey, Mexico's third-largest city, will host a CART race in 2001, it was announced over the weekend.