Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: De Ferran shooting for fast start in the IRL series

Wednesday, March 13, 2002 | 11:02 a.m.

Brian Hilderbrand covers motor sports for the Las Vegas Sun. His motor sports notebook appears Friday. He can be reached at bh@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4089.

As Gil de Ferran attempts to win his third consecutive open-wheel championship -- and first since Team Penske jumped from CART to the Indy Racing League -- he is somewhat comforted by the fact that the first four races of the season are at tracks on which he competed while in CART.

De Ferran, who is coming off a second-place finish in the IRL season opener at Homestead-Miami Speedway, said it is important to post strong finishes this weekend at Phoenix Raceway, next weekend at California Speedway and the following race at Nazareth Speedway to position himself in the championship battle.

"The championship is a real tough 15 races and there are certainly (tracks) that you're stronger and (tracks) that you're weaker," de Ferran said. "The fact that we have a higher degree of familiarity with these first few tracks that we're going to increases our chances.

"It's important that we collect as many points as we can over those races that we have a higher chance of doing well. We certainly had a good run at Homestead but you've got to attack one weekend at a time."

After the first five races, including the May 26 Indianapolis 500, the final 10 races of the season include eight events at seven tracks on which de Ferran never has raced. The IRL schedule also has no road-course races -- something de Ferran said he would miss.

"I always did enjoy racing ovals and I totally enjoyed, very much, racing at Homestead -- it was actually a lot of fun," he said. "The fun factor of racing ovals is always going to be there and I'm happy to be doing that.

"I never made any secret about the fact that I am certainly missing and I am going to miss -- probably forever -- road racing; that's how I first fell in love with the sport, that's how I started, that's my background and I'll miss it. But it's a fact of life, I guess. I'm trying to make myself as good an oval driver as I can and to try to challenge for the championship."

The IRL schedule also features two stops this season at Texas Motor Speedway -- a track CART attempted to race on last season but cancelled the event when drivers complained of dizziness due to extreme speeds on the steeply banked track. In nine events at the 1.5-mile oval since 1997, the IRL has not encountered problems due to the cars' aerodynamic package.

"I have run the IRL cars in Texas and I have to say they're very well adapted to running over there," de Ferran said. "In my mind, the situation in Texas with the CART cars is there's really nothing wrong with the track and nothing wrong with the cars -- it's just one thing wasn't suited to the other.

"I have to say the IRL has developed a technical package that is very well adapted to running this type of racetrack."

Tuesday's test session was rained out. Fittipaldi is scheduled to compete in six Busch Series races this season, beginning March 23 at Bristol, in an Innovative Motorsports Inc. Chevrolet sponsored by Mike's Hard Lemonade.

Kinser holds a 41-point lead over reigning WoO champ Danny Lasoski in the standings after four races. Mark Kinser is in third place, only three points behind Lasoski.