Race No. 18
Honda Indy
Surfer's Paradise
Gold Coast, Australia
October 16-18, 1998
Raceday Quotes from Australia:| MARK BLUNDELL | ADRIAN FERNANDEZ | CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI |
| DARIO FRANCHITTI | MAURICIO GUGELMIN | TONY KANAAN |
| SCOTT PRUETT | PAUL TRACY | ALEX ZANARDI |
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Target Chip Ganassi Racing Reynard Honda |
| ALEX ZANARDI | |
| Obviously, it was great to be back in the winner's circle in a place like this that I love so much. I was very disappointed yesterday when I didn't get the pole, but I'm very, very excited today. [On his late-race splash-and-go pit stop] It was going to be a very hard call if [the race] hadn't gone full-course yellow. Obviously, Chip [Ganassi, team owner] had reason to believe it would, and it turned out to be a good call, as it has been all year, so all credit to him. I knew I had the car to do the job, and I thought once I was in front there wasn't much to worry about other than driving a beautiful race car, which is what I had all day. If Dario [Franchitti] makes a mistake trying to stay in front of me and he goes out, that's obviously the best situation for our team. But he remained very cool, pardon the expression, so as it turned out, the best thing I could do for my teammate [Jimmy Vasser] was to finish ahead of him and take a few more points away. | |
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Kmart/Texaco Havoline Newman/Haas Racing Swift Ford |
| CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI | |
| We've had a pretty tough time all year and I'm very happy with the way the weekend went. I wanted to win this race very badly, but both of these guys [Alex Zanardi and Dario Franchitti] drove a hell of a race. They didn't make any mistakes. I was trying all means to try and keep up with them, but unfortunately, it wasn't possible. It's a good way to finish ... now I want to close out the season on a high note and try to pick up where we left off when the season starts next year. | |
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Hollywood Reynard Mercedes |
| MAURICIO GUGELMIN | |
| The fact that we got a championship point is a credit to the engineers and the pit crew. They made the right strategy calls and gave me really quick pit stops. I think if we hadn't had the last two yellows, we could have finished in the top six, because we had plenty of fuel at the end. The car wasn't great. I had a lot of understeer that made me slow in the middle of the corners and then slow out. We made the best of it and stuck together and got a point. | |
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PacWest Motorola Reynard Mercedes |
| MARK BLUNDELL | |
| I'm happy we managed to finish in the points. The guys did good pit stops, and we ran a strategy with a very lean fuel mixture, which proved to be the right thing. If it wasn't for the last couple of yellows, we were looking good, because I'm sure some of the others in front of us would have had to stop again. But that's one of those things. We've got a couple more points in the bag, and it's time to defend our title in California. | |
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Visteon Reynard Ford |
| SCOTT PRUETT | |
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The day went well for the Visteon team. I was concentrating on fuel mileage all day long and I
was still able to do fast laps. That was the name of the game. Jim McGee made the right call. He has been through this numerous times and today once again he made the right decisions. I can't say enough about the Ford engine and the Firestone tires. We had a great set-up today. This race at Surfers Paradise is by far the premier event in the FedEx Championship Series. The points race is still very tight and I am really looking forward to Fontana and the opportunity to move up in the standings and to win the $1 million bonus. | |
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LCI International Tasman Motorsports Group LCI Reynard Honda |
| TONY KANAAN | |
| Well, I would say just one word -- Honda. Thanks to Honda. They had the best fuel mixtures and that's why we finished the race. Some people did one more pit stop than us. We had very, very good fuel mileage. The strategy was perfect. The car wasn't that good. We had a car to finish probably 18th. Honda, Steve (Horne), Martin Pare, Diane (Holl) -- all my engineers -- gave me the opportunity to finish in the top seven and we closed the gap for eighth in the championship. I wanted to try to win this race, but we couldn't. So, let's go to Fontana and try to win over there. It's going to be fun -- a million dollars! | |
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Team Kool Green Reynard Honda |
| DARIO FRANCHITTI | |
|
We were just a fraction slower than Zanardi on the first stop and that was
the difference. The only chance I had was on one of the re-starts. Other
than that, I couldnt get close enough. Car to car, I think my KOOL car
was quicker than Alex today. But he had nothing to lose and I had a lot to
lose. So second place today is good. Weve moved up to second in the championship and have a bit of a gap back to Jimmy (Vasser). You cant win them all, but it would be great if you could. | |
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Team Kool Green Reynard Honda |
| PAUL TRACY | |
| Michael (Andretti) hit me in the rear on the back straightaway. He hit me so hard it punctured the left rear tire, bent the suspension and severed a rear brake line. So I was driving the car with only front brakes. Doing 190 mph down to 30 mph for the corners with no rear brakes, its just not safe to be out there. Im disappointed for the KOOL team. I had a good car and we were just trying to make the necessary fuel mileage to finish on the podium. | |
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Tecate Beer/Quaker State Patrick Racing Reynard Ford |
| ADRIAN FERNANDEZ | |
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The Tecate/Quaker State car was good today. We made a good start and passed some cars on
the track. In the end though, things didn't go our way. We pitted early because we figured we
didn't have enough fuel to finish the race. Then all the yellow flags at the end didn't help us.
It was a shame the way the end of the race went and very frustrating. But overall I am pleased with our finish. The Tecate/Quaker State team moved a few points closer to third place and put some ground between us and Greg who is in fifth place. I think it will take a miracle for us to finish second but we have a good shot at third place. | |