Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: Fast start pleasant surprise for Tracy

Friday, April 11, 2003 | 8:56 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.

LONG BEACH, Calif. -- Paul Tracy of Las Vegas finds himself in unfamiliar territory heading into the third race of the 2003 CART Champ Car season.

While Tracy has been the series points leader after two races as recently as the 2000 season, never in his 11 full seasons in CART has he gotten off to such a fast start. Tracy won the season-opening race in St. Petersburg, Fla., and backed that up with a victory three weeks ago in Monterrey, Mexico.

Not since his final season in CART's minor league, the Indy Lights series, has Tracy put on such a dominating performance. He has led 140 of the 190 laps run this season and holds an 11-point lead over Michel Jourdain Jr. in the championship.

Not bad for a driver who refers to himself as a slow starter.

"I think the year I won the Indy Lights championship in '90, I think that year I won nine of 12 races," Tracy said as he prepared for Sunday's Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. "So, I mean, it was so long ago, 1990, and it doesn't really translate to what I'm doing now.

"I'm happy that I got off to a good start and it's a nice change. Normally, I'm a slow starter and it takes me a little while to get going. I think the advantage is that a lot of these tracks that we are going to go to in the next five or six races, I know very well, and I know the car and I know the crew guys I'm working with. Hopefully we can do well throughout the whole season."

Tracy, 34, admittedly is a little surprised with his results this season considering he is in his first season with Player's/Forsythe Racing after spending the past five seasons driving for Team Kool Green.

"To start off with a new team ... I think we have surpassed our expectations for the first couple of races of the year," Tracy said. "Our goal was really just to finish the races and get points. And to come out of it with two wins and most laps led and 43 points has just been fantastic.

"I thought that coming to a new team and being surrounded by new people at the beginning of the year, I felt would be a little bit harder (to win right away). We weren't the fastest car in testing so my expectation levels were that ... maybe it would take some time. My goals are the same, though. My goal is the championship and to try to score points in every race."

Tracy's quest for his first Champ Car championship resumes this weekend on the streets of Long Beach -- and Tracy is justifiably confident he can continue his torrid start. Tracy earned the first Champ Car victory of his career here in 1993 and he notched his second Long Beach title in 2000.

"I seem to always run well at Long Beach so I am enthusiastic about this weekend," he said. "Pat (teammate Patrick Carpentier) has been testing over in Phoenix, so we are learning more about the car, and my engineers are over there watching the tests.

"I think that I have a really good chance of winning there because I've always run well there and I've been able to win the race there twice in the past."

Although Tracy said he is a little more relaxed having won the first two races of the season, he doesn't plan to change his strategy this weekend -- or for the remainder of the season.

"A lot of people weren't picking me as a favorite to win the championship before the season started and now we've had two races and I guess, really, all I can do is just try to go into each race and try to minimize the mistakes that I can make on the racetrack and minimize the problems," he said.

"You go through a (race) weekend and you make thousands of decisions on what you're going to do on car setup or this or that and try to make all of the right decisions. Hopefully, at the end of the day, we've made more good ones than bad ones and that will translate into more wins and good finishes. I think all I can do is keep doing what I've been doing and getting prepared for each individual race that comes up."

Fellow Las Vegas residents Carpentier, Jimmy Vasser and Alex Tagliani will join Tracy in the 29th running of the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach.

Bodine, who has 18 career Winston Cup victories, said he is exploring the television side of racing while he awaits a chance to get back in a Winston Cup car.

"I really feel like I can still get out there and mix it up with the youngest of guys," Bodine said. "You never know what might develop here in this business so I keep my options open and keep my helmet in my bag."

Bodine, 53, said it is more difficult these days for a veteran driver to land a job with a major sponsor or a competitive team.

"The situation right now is that all these owners and sponsors want the young kids," Bodine said. "When I was trying to get into Winston Cup in the early '80s ... owners and sponsor were looking for the experienced guys to drive their cars -- they didn't want rookies that might wreck. It was really hard for a rookie back in those days to find an opportunity to drive.

"Now, it's just the opposite because these teams have the financial resources to put a rookie in their car and go through some wrecks. It's a big cycle and I've been on the wrong end of it twice now, when I was trying to get in and now that I'd like to stay in."

The Speed Channel's telecast of the Orleans 222 will be shown on a tape-delayed basis next Saturday at 7 a.m. (PDT).

In addition the Winston West race, ARCA Trucks and Thunder Roadsters will be racing Saturday at The Bullring. Spectator gates open at 4 p.m., qualifying begins at 4:15 and racing gets under way at 6:45 p.m. The 222-lap Winston West race is scheduled to take the green flag at 8 p.m.

It had been announced on March 20 that the car was being excluded from the final race results because pf a technical violation. Officials of the International Motor Sports Association, the sanctioning body for the American Le Mans Series, overturned the ruling that the fuel capacity in the Porsche 911 GT3 RS exceeded the maximum allowable capacity of 100 liters.

IMSA officials determined that certain procedural issues regarding the testing of the fuel capacity reasonably presented a material question as to the validity of the testing. In addition, the review determined that the team did not have the opportunity to question the procedures and request an on-site retest before the car was released.

Johnny Mowlem, Nic Jonsson and Craig Stanton drove the Petersen/White Lightning entry in the race.

"I'm calling this a self-imposed sabbatical," Cheever said. "I'm not sure what I'm going to do in the future. All I know right now is that I have too much going on. I haven't been able to spend any time preparing to race at Indy."

Cheever has competed in the past 13 Indianapolis 500s.

Parrott, who was fired as Dale Jarrett's crew chief earlier in the week, served as crew chief for Burton and the No. 9 Busch Series team in 2002.

The team of Gus Vildosola and Las Vegas' Rob MacCachren has moved into the Trophy Truck division points lead after a victory in San Felipe and a runner-up finish in Laughlin.

The SCORE Desert Series returns to the Las Vegas Valley in July for the second annual SCORE Henderson's Terrible 250.

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