• Good Morning from the City of Lights--Cleveland, Ohio, for Race Day in the Midwest! Today's Round Nine of the FedEx Championship Series takes the Green Flag at 1 p.m. to start the Marconi Grand Prix of Cleveland Presented by Firstar. Today's weather is chancy: the low pressure system to the northwest is coming in fast; strong southwest winds to 25 mph will change to the northwest around lunch and that starts the one-to-two hour countdown to a strong chance of showers, less scattered than yesterday. The Burke Lakefront Airport weather team estimates the squalls to present themselves from 1-2 p.m. So once again, weather will play a roll in the road course portion of the 2001 season!

• Championship Auto Racing Teams is joining with England's Rockingham Motor Speedway to sponsor the seventh annual Motorsports Industry Association Awards conducted in the Cholmondey Room and Terrace at the House of Lords in London Monday evening. CART Chairman and CEO Joe Heitzler will be one of the featured guests among the more than 300 attendees from all aspects of the worldwide motorsports industry. Also in attendance will be Rockingham's David Grace as well as Hans-Jorg Fisher, the head man from Germany's EuroSpeedway.

• GREEN FLAG waves at 9 a.m. to start the final practice session of the weekend. Firestone engineers report a track temperature of 91 degrees F. and an ambient temperature of 83 degrees F. at the start of the session.

• At 9:10 a.m., 10 minutes into the session, the fastest driver is #3 CASTRONEVES with a lap of 123.943 mph (1:01.170; sixth lap), followed by #40 FERNANDEZ (122.745 mph; 1:01.350; sixth lap) and #52X NAKANO (122.725 mph; 1:01.777; seventh lap).

• At 9:11 a.m., CART course observers report a spray of fluid from the rear of the car of #33 TAGLIANI while the car is at speed on course. TAGLIANI subsequently pits his car for inspection in the Pits.

• At 9:12 a.m., #5 TAKAGI slides off course at Turn 6 and breaks the right wing off before the driver can regain control. TAKAGI drives back to his Pit Box for repairs.

• RED FLAG waves at 9:14 a.m. after #18 DIXON stalls on course at the Turn 6 run-off and CART safety crews are unable to start the car. The car is towed back to Pit Road for inspection. The driver will receive the standard eight-minute delay-of-session penalty to be served upon the reappearance of the Green Flag.

• GREEN FLAG waves at 9:17 a.m. to resume the session.

• At 9:20 a.m., 20 minutes into the session, the fastest driver is now #32 CARPENTIER with a lap of 124.712 mph (1:00.793; eighth lap), followed by #40 VASSER (124.685 mph; 1:00.806; ninth lap) and #22 SERVIA (124.395 mph; 1:00.948; 11th lap).

• At 9:21 a.m., #22 SERVIA spins at Turn 4 but continues on course without apparent damage to the car.

• At 9:23 a.m., #27 FRANCHITTI runs off course at Turn 4 but regains control and continues on course.

• RED FLAG waves at 9:28 a.m. after #7 PAPIS spins at Turn 4 and makes light contact with the tire barrier, stalling the car. The driver is uninjured in the incident but the car sustains light damage. The driver will receive the standard eight-minute delay-of-session penalty to be carried over to the next road/street course race, Toronto in two weeks.

• CHECKERED FLAG waves at 9:28:30 a.m. after CART Race Control determines that the car of #7 PAPIS is in a dangerous spot just off the track and the time needed to remove the car will exceed the scheduled end of the session. #3 CASTRONEVES is the fastest driver at the end of the session with a lap of 126.556 mph (59.907 seconds; 17th lap), followed by #77 HERTA (126.162 mph; 1:00.094; 19th lap) and #26 TRACY (126.125 mph; 1:00.112; 14th lap). FedEx Championship Series drivers introduced 27 cars to the track in this morning's session with secondary cars utilized by #8X BRACK, #4X JUNQUEIRA, #52X NAKANO, and #18X DIXON. The top 18 cars are separated by less than one second in lap times at the end of the session.

• Trap speeds still show a close field with a few new faces making an appearance at the top of the charts. A three-way tie at the top for the Start/Finish line Trap features session-second-fastest #77 HERTA, 16th-fastest #33 TAGLIANI and 19th-fastest #5 TAKAGI logging a 168.350 mph trip. The Trap 2 features #77 HERTA all alone at 97.986 mph, followed by fourth-fastest #17 GUGELMIN (95.694 mph). The Trap 2 has #7 PAPIS up front at 114.431 mph, followed by #52X NAKANO (113.636 mph).

• Next up the Marconi Grand Prix of Cleveland Presented by Firstar!

• In the downtime between the morning warm-up and the start of the race, quite a few Champ Car fans are deliberating around the world on who their picks for today's winner will be. Without further ado, here's the skinny to keep the stats in your pocket instead of the competition's. Look for a full podium from the front three rows. Over the last six years, the winner has come from an averaged starting spot on the grid of 2.5; second from 5.2, and third from 6th flat. In fact, in the last five years, only one driver has come from farther back than seventh on the grid to stand on the podium: last year's 15th-place starter KENNY BRACK. The margin of victory has averaged 3.9 seconds, but that is impacted by a 10.604-second margin in 1999 and an 8.422-second margin in 1998. The rest of the margins are .826 to 1.281. The first Yellow should fly by Lap 25 with 11.3 laps run under the Caution and the Yellow flying an average of 2 times. There should be 3.8 cars retired due to contact and 16 cars running at the end of the race. Of course, today's impending weather could throw most of this baby out with the bath water so, as usual in racing, good luck will be needed by you all!