Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: Herta lands meaty deal with McDonald’s

Friday, Jan. 21, 2000 | 9:42 a.m.

Brian Hilderbrand's motor sports notebook appears Friday. Reach him at bh@vegas.com or 259-4089.

It was touch and go for a while, and it almost appeared he might be watching from the sidelines this season before Bryan Herta finally landed a ride for the 2000 CART season.

But it took some doing.

Herta, who co-owns the Las Vegas Karting Center near Jean, will drive for Gerry Forsythe's McDonald's racing team after Hollywood Cigarettes of Brazil bought Tony Kanaan's contract from Forsythe, freeing the 25-year-old Brazilian to join Mo Nunn's new CART team.

"I think this is nothing but positive," said Herta, who was let go by Team Rahal at the end of the 1999 season. "If you would have asked me two months ago if this was the way it was going to work out, I might not have believed it, but I'm glad this is the way it has gone."

In his new position, Herta is reunited with Forsythe Racing president Steve Horne and chief mechanic Steve Ragan, with whom Herta teamed in 1993 to win the Indy Lights championship.

Until he signed his contract with Forsythe, it appeared Herta might be without a ride this season despite winning two races and six poles in the past four seasons with Rahal.

But Herta said he never gave up hope that he would be on the starting grid for the season-opening race this spring -- although he acknowledged it may have been in an Indy Racing League car rather than a Champ car.

"There's always things going on behind the scenes and I would say it was a very interesting ride throughout the winter," Herta said. "Because of the way things progressed, I was always in contact with good people and there was always interest. So as long as that's there, then I felt quite good. "And I did have some offers and some interest from other areas, some sports cars and some IRL teams. So I guess as a business or as a commodity, there was still some interest; there was still a demand for my driving services, and that was quite comforting."

What might prove to be unsettling for Herta is the fact that he will be the only driver on the circuit to be piloting a Swift chassis with Honda power after driving a Reynard/Ford for Rahal.

"Certainly, going in, the Swift is a question mark for everybody right now, just because we haven't driven it," Herta said before completing his first test in his new car Thursday at Laguna Seca Raceway.

"With the way the CART testing rules are, it's going to hurt us or make it a little tougher for us more than probably most people. We're limited now to 12 preseason test days and I think like six days during the season, where a two-car team would get a little bit more."

Not that Herta is viewing his move from the two-car Rahal team to the single-car effort of Forsythe in a totally negative light.

"There's a certain advantage in the fact that this is a very focused program, obviously, and the factory is working very specifically and very closely with the team to develop the car in a way that's probably unique in CART racing," Herta said. "I would liken it more to like a Formula One style program more so than probably we've seen, at least other than the way maybe (Roger) Penske has done it in the past. There's certain advantages in being able to have that close relationship and being able to work that closely with the manufacturer. I expect to see a lot of development pieces throughout the season. Because we don't have to produce 20, 30 of them; they can produce two if they are good and continue the development program."

* NASCAR: Bruton Smith is at it again. The president of Speedway Motorsports, Inc., which counts Las Vegas Motor Speedway among its holdings, told USA Today that NASCAR needs to do something to add excitement to its Winston Cup racing.

"I don't think we had many good races last year; a lot of the races we had were very dull and I think NASCAR needs to address what's wrong," Smith said. "If (races) are going to be dull, it makes it more difficult to sell tickets. Let's put more spoiler on the cars so those guys can drive side by side.

"If we can get those cars to stick when they go down in the turns, well, I want to see these guys going in there and doing some rubbing, maybe Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt. Maybe (Gordon's) right-front wheel burns the No. 3 off (Earnhardt's) door, you know. Those things get exciting, and if your car is handling, you can do those types of things."

Last year, Smith suggested that the Indy Racing League needed to add fenders to its cars and make the cars' bodies bigger so they would be more easily identifiable to the fans. Thankfully, Smith dropped those ideas. ...

Las Vegan Kurt Busch posted the 22nd fastest time during a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series test at Daytona International Speedway last weekend. Busch, who drives the Exide Batteries truck for Roush Racing, posted a fast lap of 184.139 mph -- more than 6 mph off the pace set by Bobby Gill (190.267).

The NCTS will run for the first time at Daytona on Feb. 18.

* CART: So much for a learning curve. Kenny Brack, the reigning Indy 500 champion who jumped from the Indy Racing League to CART last winter, posted the fastest time among five drivers during a recent test at Miami-Dade Homestead Motorsports Complex.

It was Brack's first test on an oval in his Team Rahal Shell Reynard/Ford.

"I went into Homestead with an open mind since I had never been there before," Brack said. "With the Handford wing, the car felt very much like the IRL car at Indy, so that was familiar to me.

"The track didn't surprise me too much since I have run nothing but ovals the last three years."

* IRL: Greg Ray, the reigning Indy Racing League champion, became the third IRL driver to be invited to participate in the 2000 International Race of Champions series.

Ray joins IRL rivals Eddie Cheever Jr. and Mark Dismore in racing's "all-star series," which features 12 drivers from different racing series competing in identically prepared stock cars.

CART will not be represented in this year's four-race IROC series because one of the IROC dates conflicts with CART's Grand Prix of Long Beach in April. ...

Davey Hamilton of Las Vegas has reached a deal to drive in next week's season-opening Delphi Indy 200 at Walt Disney World Speedway for Sinden Racing Service.

Hamilton, who remains under contract to Galles Racing although the team lacks the funding to prepare a second car for Hamilton, will drive a 1999 Dallara/Aurora in the race.

* NHRA: John Force, who won nine of 10 NHRA Winston Funny Car championships in the '90s, has been nominated for an ESPY award in the Driver of the Decade category.

Force also received his second Jerry Titus Memorial Trophy earlier this month from the American Auto Racing Writers and Broadcasters Association. The Titus Memorial Trophy is given annually to honor the AARWBA driver of the year. ...

On Feb. 20th, during the Daytona 500, the NHRA will air its first-ever nationally televised commercial. It is scheduled to air during the first break of the race. The commercial will mark the beginning of a multi-faceted ad campaign by the NHRA. ...

Mail-order parts company Summit Racing will be the title sponsor for the inaugural NHRA national event at Las Vegas Motor Speedway April 6-9.

* BACKMARKERS: More than 205 racers, including 25 from Southern Nevada, have submitted entries to compete in this weekend's sixth annual SCORE Laughlin Desert Challenge.

The race will be split into two days (Saturday and Sunday) and each of the 16 class winners will be determined by the elapsed two-day time of each driver.

The featured Trophy Truck division will race at noon each day while the high-tech unlimited Class 1 will take the green flag at 10:10 a.m. each day.

General admission tickets for grandstand seats are $8 each day. The grandstand area is located near the intersection of Big Bend Drive and Edison Way in Laughlin.

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