Race No. 6
Motorola 300
Gateway International Raceway — Madison, Illinois
May 27-29, 1999
Saturday Quotes from Gateway: | Forsythe Player's/Indeck Reynard Mercedes Finished: 6th |
| GREG MOORE | |
| Somehow, we went from third to seventh and we just couldn't come back up. But we leave here with more points and we can look favourably to next week's race in Milwaukee. We're looking for a win on a track we really enjoy. | |
 | Kmart/Texaco/Havoline Swift Ford Finished: 1st |
| MICHAEL ANDRETTI | |
| Obviously, they were telling me that Helio was coming on, but I've got to give the credit to Firestone. We decided, because of track position, not to take on tires on the last (pit) stop, so we just went out and did a very quick stop. It was a gamble, because we didn't know if the tires would make it the rest of the way. The tires were incredible, they just kept going and going and going. They had a lot to do with this win. Also the whole Kmart/Texaco team, they called a perfect race. I think our second-to-last pit stop, bringing me in, I questioned it. they said, 'no, do it.' I think me and Dario (Franchitti) pitted at the same time. I was like, 'well, we just gave away a lot of good track position.' They said, 'no, this is going to help us beat the other guys out of the pits on the last stop, because we won't have to put in as much fuel.' It was perfect strategy, they did a great job. The Ford engine ran perfect and the Swift was perfect. I knew Helio was coming on in the end. What I felt that I needed to do, I knew Helio had fresher tires, so the tires normally have about 20 laps in them where they really go good, and then they start to go off to a certain point and then they hold. I just knew I had to hold off his challenge there for awhile. I felt like, if I could do that, then I should be able to hold him off for the rest of the race. There were a couple of times where he got a little close, but he was never able to get close enough. He did a good job, but I just felt that that's what we needed to do. | |
 | Kmart/Texaco Havoline Newman/Haas Racing Swift Ford Finished: 9th |
| CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI | |
| We were as fast as anyone out there maybe with the exception of Helio (Castro-Neves). It was a little disappointing because we had a few problems on the pit stops which hurt us. The car was very strong today. We did manage to score points again and that will help us as we continue to battle for the Championship. | |
 | Herdez Competition Payton/Coyne Lola Ford Finished: 20th |
| MICHEL JOURDAIN | |
| At the start the car's performance was okay, but after my first pit stop the engine lost some power. Finally, after the second pit stop was worse. I was 1.5 seconds per lap slower than the pack. So, the team decided to retire. I had no sense to put in jeopardy my peers and my car. | |
 | Miller Lite Team Rahal Reynard Ford Finished: 5th |
| MAX PAPIS | |
| We could have gotten on the podium today but the tires on the left side didn't hold up. It was a very competitive race and we played it very well. A sure spot on the podium got away but we will get it back soon. I can't say enough about the team. We are working very well together and we keep knocking on the door and we will get one pretty soon. | |
 | Shell Team Rahal Reynard Ford Finished: 23rd |
| BRYAN HERTA | |
| I had no where to go. I am not sure how (the incident) was triggered. It is so hard to pass out there that if a guy sees an opening he goes right at it. I think one of the Kool cars went dive bombing on (Patrick) Carpentier and one of those guys hit me and spun me up into the wall. There was nothing I could do. It is a shame because although the car was not great but we were hoping to hang on and make the car better and try and get some points today. It has just been one thing after another this year. We are going to come back strong for Milwaukee. I am so upset right now all I want to do is get to Milwaukee, put some points up and then go to Portland and win the race. | |
 | Team Kool Green Reynard Honda Finished: 3rd |
| DARIO FRANCHITTI | |
| The biggest incident in the race for me--there was a couple of them actually--but the big one was Paul into Turn Three. I got a run coming off of Two, I drafted alongside him on the straight. I had the track, but he turned in. He wasn't going to give any ground. We were very close, there's a bump right at the entry to Three and I hit that, which put my frontend into him. After that I was just hanging on, there was no skill involved in that one. I did a turn left and spun, the thing was going backwards spinning the tires. I just wanted to steer out of it and score as many points as I could. But I have to say, it was a good race today. It was pretty exciting. After the race ended last year, we were a bit worried about it. I think it was a good race, very good for the championship. It was a good day. We didn't win, we have a habit of getting on the podium and not winning. I don't know what's happening here. We're going to have to break that pretty soon. We'll take the points and we'll keep chasing. We're in a lot better position than we were at this time last year, and I'm looking forward to the road course season starting. | |
 | Team Kool Green Reynard Honda Finished: 19th |
| PAUL TRACY | |
| Well, I’m not very happy right now. I’m not sure exactly what happened. I have to talk to Dario. Obviously, it’s all the more disappointing considering how well the car was working and what a great job the Team KOOL Green guys did on the pit stops. | |
 | Target Chip Ganassi Racing Reynard Honda Finished: 11th |
| JUAN MONTOYA | |
| Starting from the pole, I felt really good but I ran out of gas and had to coast into the pits. That put me down one lap. I fought back and kept pushing and pushing to get back into the race, but we were battling a lot of understeer on and off all day. I'm disappointed. We finished in the points, but we're not really where we should be. Everybody has some bad luck sometimes, and today it was me. We are having a good year, but days like today are tough for me. We come here to race and win, and when we don't it is frustrating. But hey, I'm still a rookie, and have a lot to learn. Today will only make me stronger. | |
 | McDonald'sForsythe Championship Racing Team Reynard Honda Finished: 7th |
| TONY KANAAN | |
| I have to say good job to my guys one more time. I think they must have won the pit stop competition for this race! The Drive-Thru Crew did an awesome job. The car was consistent all the time. It was just hard to pass in traffic. It was really hard. I got stuck behind PJ (Jones) for so long, running 27.4's. As soon as I passed him, I did a 26.4. That put us a little bit behind, but overall it was a good race. Top 10 was our goal for here and that's our goal for Milwaukee. | |
 | Tecate Beer/Quaker State Patrick Racing Swift Ford Finished: 21st |
| ADRIAN FERNANDEZ | |
| We were running very strong today. But, on my first stop into the pits my clutch was slipping and that caused the car to jump on me and I almost ran over one of my crew members and then we had this problem with the oil line later in the race. We had a car capable of a top four or five finish. It's disappointing because we would have definitely scored points towards the championship today. | |
 | Hogan Racing Lola Mercedes Finished: 2nd |
| HELIO CASTRO-NEVES | |
| First of all, I want to thank Mercedes, Firestone, and especially Carl Hogan. I mean, Hogan Racing did a fantastic job. I'm really proud of them. The guys did a great job in the pits. I believe they learned from Nazareth. I'm very proud of them, we did an excellent move. I did a mistake on the beginning of the first pit stop, I thought everything was done. But Carl said a lot of good things on the radio which made me very strong. I knew we had a good car, it was just a matter of time. I had to be patient, and once I was on the pace, everything was going so fast. On the last pit stop, when we were sixth or something like that, I just had to focus on how I was going to pass the guys. My car just felt so good. I was taking chances all over the place, especially Turn Three, going into Turn Three my car was really good. When I got behind Michael, I was braking very late in Turn One. I tried catching him from that place, but he had a very good exit of both turns, which made him be okay. I saw his car started moving around in the rear, and that's when I got a little patient. I said, 'well, just wait.' There was, like, 30 laps to go. I just thought to myself, when the backmarkers start to happen, that's the moment to pass. But he's an excellent driver, he knows how to win, and he did it. When I saw that I got only one chance, I tried not to blow it, because the day was already very exciting. I didn't want to go from hero to zero. I just tried to finish, and I'm telling you, we had a car and we proved we can be at the top. We're going to go on to Milwaukee with more confidence." | |
 | Patrick Racing Visteon Swift Ford Finished: 8th |
| P.J. JONES | |
| I wish we could have held on for a little better finish. The bottom line is that we have to start to qualify better. I ran 140 laps on my last set of tires and that's a lot to ask of them. The car started to go away with about 20 laps left and I had my hands full a few times. We probably should have put tires on during our last stop, but on the flip side of that we would not have made up the position in the pits that we did so you can look at it both ways. I may have been able to pass some cars with new tires but you can't really second guess yourself. You could do that all day. I am happy with the finish and not it's on to Milwaukee where I hope we can continue to build on the success we seems to have started since Nazareth. | |
 | Team Gordon Swift Toyota Finished: 27th |
| ROBBY GORDON | |
| I drove my golf cart back from the medical trailer to our garage, so I guess that means I'm fine. The ankle's fine. The calf's little sore. The bigger issue for me is trying to figure out what happened. I lost it way before I ever got to the corner. That's odd. The car gave no indication of being loose there all weekend. Maybe a tire went down. Maybe something broke on the car. I'll be anxious to find out. It's frustrating because we had a very good car today, and we'll never know what the final outcome would have been had we not crashed. The tethers did their job, because everything was intact on the car. I'll be fine tomorrow. I had a great race car here today, and I know I have a great race car for the 500. It's just a shame that the weekend started out this way. But we'll get over it, especially if we have a good day tomorrow. | |
 | Team Kool Green Team manager |
| BARRY GREEN | |
| It looked like it was just one of those racing incidents. The two of them got together and just touched. It wasn’t a big hit. I think Paul probably thought Dario had backed off, and Dario was sort of trying to get out of there but he was too committed (to the corner). It’s too bad. They were both running very well. It would have been a great finish. | |