Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: Hornish evokes images of former superstars

Friday, April 13, 2001 | 10:18 a.m.

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

Sam Hornish Jr. is exactly what the Indy Racing League has been looking for: A young American driver with an abundance of talent to carry its banner.

The fact that he has won the first two races of the season is icing on the cake.

Hornish's surprising start to the season in the Pennzoil Panther Racing entry has led many to compare the 21-year-old Ohio native to another driver who piloted the familiar yellow Pennzoil racer.

"Everybody says he's the next Rick Mears and all that but I say he's the next Sam Hornish," team owner John Barnes said. "I think his own individual talents and the way he attacks things is very unique to him."

Hornish, who is in his second full season in the IRL, takes the comparison in stride.

"It's a great honor to be in the seat ... with Pennzoil being the sponsor, not only did Johnny Rutherford and (Al Unser Sr.) and Rick Mears all drive the Pennzoil car, they all won the Indianapolis 500 and I'd like to be one of those drivers to do that," Hornish said.

"I don't feel pressure put on me by other people, but I like to put pressure on myself because I feel that I work better under pressure. If I don't have that pressure pushing me to succeed, then I tend to start slacking off and I'm not on top of my game anymore."

That hasn't been a problem for Hornish, who said it will not be easy for him to get overconfident or cocky because of his early season success.

"The guys on the Pennzoil Panther team are a bunch of great guys and they'll keep me straight and make sure that I'm not getting too big of a head," Hornish said.

"I just want to keep doing the things that I'm doing. Whether I'm winning races or not, it's just a love of the sport, a love of being in the car that keeps me happy and as long as I'm doing that, I don't think I'm going to get overconfident."

Hornish's back-to-back wins are the first since Greg Ray won two in a row en route to winning the series championship in 1999. Pennzoil Panther Racing now has won three races in a row; Scott Goodyear won the 2000 season finale at Texas Motor Speedway in his final race for the team.

"We haven't really done a lot differently from last year to this year ... Sam has just brought a little different approach to (the team)," Barnes said. "Not to take anything away from Scott Goodyear because Scott did a tremendous job for us ... but the chemistry is working for us."

And for the IRL.

Woods, 24, one of the top young black racers, competes in the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series at Irwindale Speedway in California, and also has run in Southwest Tour and Winston West events.

Wood, the 18-year-old son of Wood Brothers Racing owner Eddie Wood, made his truck-series debut last weekend in Martinsville, Va., with a 31st-place finish in a Wood Brothers-prepared truck. ...

NASCAR's appeals committee has rescinded the $20,000 fine against John Andretti's crew chief after the team proved broken chassis welds caused the car to fail inspection.

Greg Steadman was penalized by NASCAR because the No. 43 Dodge did not meet height requirements at the conclusion of Andretti's second-place finish at Bristol Motor Speedway last month.

The National Stock Car Racing Commission ruled that it was "extremely unlikely that a cracked chassis would have occurred by design" and found that the height variance did not give Andretti a competitive advantage.

"I think one of these days I might have a meeting with CART and maybe something good will come out of that meeting," Smith said during last weekend's NHRA national event at LVMS. "Maybe we can talk them into doing something they haven't done yet."

Among the options LVMS and CART are believed to be exploring are a night race at the 1.5-mile superspeedway -- CART never has run a race under the lights at any facility -- and a date immediately following the Indianapolis 500. ...

Las Vegas resident Patrick Carpentier said he expects to drive in the April 29 race in Texas despite undergoing surgery for a broken wrist this week.

"The surgery, which lasted two hours and a quarter, was a complete success," Carpentier said Thursday. "But with nine new screws and two metal plates in my wrist, it seems like I'm coming back from the hardware store instead of the clinic.

"Even though Dr. Trammell didn't want to confirm right away that I would be able to race in Texas, he told me that he would be very surprised if I had to miss the race."

Among the 33 drivers committed to compete in the race are CART regulars Gil de Ferran and Helio Castroneves (Penske Racing), Nicolas Minassian and Bruno Junqueira (Target/Chip Ganassi Racing) and Michael Andretti (Team Motorola/Archipelago).

Other notable drivers who filed entries before Wednesday's deadline were two-time Indy 500 winner Al Unser Jr. of Henderson, Davey Hamilton of Las Vegas, two-time Indy 500 winner Arie Luyendyk and former race winners Eddie Cheever Jr and Buddy Lazier.

Ricky Carmichael won his 10th consecutive 250cc EA Sports Supercross event last weekend in Pontiac, Mich., and is closing in on Jeremy McGrath's record of 13 straight wins, set in 1996.

If Carmichael can win the next two races (in Dallas and Salt Lake City), he will be in position to tie McGrath's mark when the EA Sports Supercross Series holds its season finale May 5 at Sam Boyd Stadium.