|
||
©1999 SpeedCenter Publishing Practice Friday at the GP Telemar Rio 200 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, ended abruptly for Robby Gordon and Team Gordon when Paul Tracy collided with Gordon in Turn Four, 30 minutes before the end of the weekend's first and only practice session. Thursday's practices were washed out due to rain. Gordon's Johns Manville/Panasonic/Menards Toyota Swift was hit in the rear, damaging the rear suspension, gearbox and rear wing. The team was unable to fix the damage before the afternoon's qualifying session and will start Saturday's race from the back of the field. There was an opportunity to qualify the team's backup Reynard chassis, but the team felt fixing the Swift and skipping qualifications was a better choice. Teams are required to race the chassis they qualify, and while shortened, the practice time with the Swift was beneficial enough to stick with the chassis for the remainder of the weekend. Saturday's 108-lap race is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. local Brazilian time, 11:30 a.m. EDT.
Mike Held (Co-Owner): "Ouch. The rollercoaster of motorsports strikes again. It put us in a position where we had to make a choice that wasn't great on either end. Run our backup or miss qualifying. Ultimately, we decided to shelve the backup, skip qualifying, and fix the Swift. It really didn't make sense to qualify a car that hadn't turned a wheel all weekend. We'd be committed to running a car that we have no data on here, and it would have been run with a blind setup. We're not too happy, but that's life and that's racing. You do everything you can to prepare and somebody throws a curve. Good news is we have the parts to replace the ones we lost in the crash, and the car will be ready to go in the morning." Source: Team Gordon |
|
|||
|