There was a mix of new faces at the top. Max Papis was second, rookie Oriol Servia third, Dario Franchitti fourth and Patrick Carpentier fifth. Montoya's Toyota team-mate Jimmy Vasser came home seventh, riding the first-finishing non-Reynard chassis. That's right. The top six finishers all piloted Reynards, with a mix of engines.
A DNF by Rookie of the Year points leader Kenny Brack meant ground gained by Alex Tagiliani, sixth place yesterday, and Oriol Servia, now tied for second.
It was a decent race for Detroit. ESPN did its usual good camera work, seemingly on top of most of the good racing.
The commentators only tried to inflate one incident into a controversy. Christian Fittipaldi put a pass on Mark Blundell but clipped Blundell's right front in the process as he braked for a right turn. Gil de Ferran, doing his best to follow Fittipaldi past the slower Blundell then punted Fittipaldi into the tire barrier. Fittipaldi apparently lost momentum after rubbing tires with Blundell, but he marched to the pits and used his TV face time to complain that de Ferran wasn't following the rules of the road.
The toughest news of the weekend came when Tony Kanaan crashed during qualifying, suffering several broken bones. Owner Mo Nunn put no one in his back-up car at Detroit, but speculation is rife about a possible replacement - super sub Memo Gidley or perhaps the return of former series champion Alex Zanardi.
The CART series moves on to the road course at Portland, with the race to be telecasted on ESPN2 during the evening of June 25th.
No doubt Montoya will snag his fifth straight pole, but the question again will be, Can he keep his Toyota togther?
The question?
How about another one? How about this? Bobby Rahal is now temporary CEO of CART, Andrew Craig having been made an offer he couldn't refuse last week.
As reported by the Associated Press' John Mossman, the reaction from the rival IRL series seemed guarded.
"Craig, head of Championship Auto Racing Teams since 1994, resigned under pressure Friday and was replaced by one of his harshest critics, Bobby Rahal, a CART board member and former driver.
Go To Page: 1 2
