Las Vegas teams struggle

Monday, May 16, 2005 | 9:28 a.m.

INDIANAPOLIS -- Richie Hearn of Las Vegas was disappointed at his qualifying speed Sunday for the Indianapolis 500 but not as much as rookie Patrick Carpentier, also of Las Vegas, at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Hearn qualified at 220.707 mph for his sixth start and fourth consecutive with car owner Sam Schmidt of Henderson in the Meijer/Coca-Cola Panoz/Chevrolet. He ranked 21st out of 22 drivers who qualified Sunday.

"We weren't close to my target, quite honestly," Hearn said. "I think we should have been in the mid-224s conservatively. I ran faster with zero-degrees on the rear wing with full tanks than I did today [Sunday] with a negative number on the wing and little fuel. The car feels good trimmed out and it handles good."

Carpentier turned in a four-lap qualifying run of 219.999 mph but was bumped from among the fastest 22 qualifiers under the Speedway's new format by veteran Dario Franchitti with a speed of 226.873 mph.

Carpentier, a nine-year open wheel veteran from Las Vegas, remarked, "It was disappointing that we got bumped, but now we're going to start working on race setup. We're going to get in, so we just need to look ahead."

Driving the Red Bull Cheever Racing Dallara/Toyota, Carpentier will be among the drivers who will need to qualify this coming Saturday or Sunday with a speed fast enough to make the 33-car starting line-up.

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