Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: A.J. Foyt IV isn’t trying to match his grandfather

Wednesday, May 14, 2003 | 9:31 a.m.

A.J. Foyt IV already has one-upped his famous grandfather by becoming the youngest driver to qualify for the Indianapolis 500.

Foyt, whose open-wheel racing career began in earnest last season when he captured the inaugural Indy Racing League Infiniti Pro Series championship, will turn 19 on May 25 -- the same day he makes his first start in the Indy 500.

But Anthony, as his family calls him, isn't hung up on trying to live up to the expectations others may have of the grandson of a four-time Indy 500 champion.

"I'm not really worried about trying to match A.J.," Foyt said Tuesday. "It would be awesome to accomplish some of the stuff that he has accomplished, but he's the best racecar driver in the world so it's kind of hard to say I'm going to match that.

"I think some people may look at it as my last name being Foyt, they expect me to come out and do really well right off the bat but I think those people around the racetrack and around racing (who) know me just know I've got a lot of learning to do and know it's going to take time."

Foyt, who drives the No. 14 Dallara/Toyota that is owned by A.J. Foyt, clearly has inherited an intense competitive desire from his grandfather. Although he qualified 23rd out of the 24 cars that made qualifying runs on Sunday, the younger Foyt was not pleased with his effort.

Foyt had practiced in excess of 228 mph before qualifying, but gusting winds on Sunday caused him to spin out on his first qualifying attempt and held him to a 224.177 mph average during his second four-lap qualifying run.

"I was definitely disappointed in my run because we ran so much quicker earlier in the month and we had been running pretty consistent times before then," Foyt said. "It seemed like we got here and everything was going good and then it kind of got a little worse day by day.

"That was definitely was not what we wanted and we know we can do better than that, it's just unfortunate that we had a day like that."

Foyt managed to keep his car off the wall during his spin on Sunday, eliciting rave reviews from the ESPN commentators for his ability to control the car. Foyt admitted there was more luck than skill involved in the incident.

"Anytime you spin and don't hit anything, you're pretty lucky -- especially at a track like this when you're going so fast," he said. "When it turned sideways, I was just waiting on that big bang because every time I've spun, I've hit something.

"It kind of put me in shock that I didn't hit anything after I was rolling backwards for a while. It was really lucky."

Castroneves will join Jerry Punch and former Las Vegas resident and IRL driver Davey Hamilton in the booth for the inaugural event.

The telecast starts at noon (PDT).

"The European stint has been disappointing," said Tracy, who won the first three races of the season. "We came in with a 26-point lead and we leave tied for first. This was not the best car I have ever driven by far. It was very slow."

Tracy said the Team Player's engineers used a setup in the car for the two races that had tested well last month at Homestead-Miami Speedway but did not handle well in the cooler weather they encountered in Europe.

"There is a lesson to be learned here as we should have done a better job in making choices before coming over here," Tracy said. "If your car is not on the same level as the others, it's hard to compete with them. I never expected the car to be that bad."

The Champ Car Series has two weeks off before running its first night race May 31 at the Milwaukee Mile -- where Tracy has recorded three of his 22 career victories.

Zanardi, the two-time CART champion who lost both his legs in a horrifying crash at EuroSpeedway in 2001, drove a specially prepared Champ Car at speeds up to 195 mph and symbolically completed the final 13 laps of the race in which he was injured.