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©1999 SpeedCenter Publishing Budweiser Champ car driver Richie Hearn will campaign a Reynard chassis for the remainder of the 1999 FedEx Championship Series, team owner John Della Penna announced this afternoon. Hearn has competed in a Swift chassis since the beginning of 1997. Hearn will utilize a 1998 Reynard purchased from Team Gordon in the upcoming Motorola 300, May 29. The team will determine whether to use the Reynard as the primary or back-up car during the race weekend, based on performance. Della Penna Motorsports will take delivery of a 1999 Reynard the week of May 25 and will run that chassis in Round Seven of the FedEx Championship Series at the Milwaukee Mile. A second 1999 Reynard is currently on order. "We have not been able to get the performance we had hoped for from the Swift," Della Penna said. "Swift has made some major improvements over the course of the 1999 season, but I believe they are still not where they need to be. The operating window on the Swift is very small and it has proven to be a difficult car to set up.' "I'm committed to giving Richie the most competitive package that I can. We sat down together and discussed our current situation and the options we had available to us. We decided this was the best choice for the team. While we expect there to be a learning curve to tackle over the next couple of months, as the team and Richie haven't dealt with a Reynard since 1996, we expect that a Toyota powered Reynard will position us well into the future." Hearn piloted a 1995 Reynard throughout his 1996 campaign in the Indy Racing League and three CART events. He scored a pole position at New Hampshire, a victory in Las Vegas, a third place finish at the Indianapolis 500 and a top-10 finish in his first CART event competing at Long Beach, "The Swift has not been working for us," said driver Richie Hearn. "We've been doing quite a bit of testing and nothing seems to improve the car. It's time to make a change. We need to get some results, for ourselves and for our sponsors. This isn't the answer to all our struggles, but hopefully it will make an impact on our performance."
Source: Della Penna Motorsports |
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