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Last man standing Carpentier avoids incident to win at Michigan
Updated: Monday July 23, 2001 12:08 AM
BROOKLYN, Mich. (AP) -- Patrick Carpentier kept waiting for Dario Franchitti or Michel Jourdain Jr. to suddenly appear in his mirrors as he approached the checkered flag in Sunday's heartstopping Harrah's 500. They never showed up -- at least not close enough to matter - and, with a little help from Player's Forsythe teammate Alex Tagliani, the 29-year-old Canadian driver came away with his first CART victory in another breathtaking CART race at Michigan International Speedway. "I couldn't believe it," Carpentier said. "Coming down the last straightaway, I was looking in my mirrors waiting for one of these guys to come by. But they weren't there. "I was crying on the lap coming into the pits and managed to stall it on the back straight," he added, laughing. "It's been a long time coming." The win came in his 79th career start, and it really didn't look like he was going to be a factor after falling behind by a lap midway through the race. "I got a lap down and didn't think I was going to win this race," Carpentier said. "I needed a yellow flag to come out late in the race to gain our lap back and it did. You have to have luck and timing, and this time it worked out."
Even after getting back on the lead lap after a crash involving Kenny Brack and Max Papis 23 laps from the end of the 250-lap event, Carpentier, who had not led a lap, appeared to be racing simply for a top-10 finish on the 2-mile oval. The sensational battle between Team Rahal teammates Brack and Papis, who had led a total of 138 laps between them, turned to disaster in a moment as they dueled with Bryan Herta for the lead. Herta, who had come from a lap down to get back into the fray, slipped past Papis on the low side of the high-banked track to take the lead as the front-runners shot through the fourth turn on the way to completing lap 233 at about 220 mph. Brack tried to pass on the high side of the banking and appeared to slide in the wake of turbulent air from Papis' car. They touched, Papis' right front to Brack's left rear, and Brack careened into the outside wall, while Papis spun into the inside barrier. Both were able to walk away from the crash without injury. "I'm OK but just hurt inside," Papis said. "As a driver, you don't get many chances to win a 500-mile race and we had the car today. Kenny and I were racing hard and we got together. We both wanted this race very badly." Brack, who retained the series lead -- by three points on Franchitti -- echoed that, saying, "I know my car had a chance to win, but it's now in a pile in the paddock area." After a quick track cleanup, the leaders took the green flag again at the start of lap 241 and the rest of the race was like a high-speed arcade game, with cars darting all over the track. Herta swapped leads with Franchitti and Jourdain before Carpentier suddenly zoomed to the front on lap 248, moving from third to first with a pass off the fourth turn. With challengers nipping at the back of his Ford-powered Player's Forsythe Reynard, Carpentier, getting some unexpected help from teammate Tagliani, was able to hold them off to the end, winning by 0.243 seconds -- about four car-lengths ahead of a dead heat by Franchitti and Jourdain. "We wanted to be second on the last lap," Carpentier said. "I was worried about Dario but, when Tag got by and gave me a pull I won. I owe him one." His best previous finishes were seconds in 1997 in Madison, Ill., and 1999 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The official scoring was inconclusive but Franchitti was awarded second place by CART officials after a photo showed him ahead by about 2 inches. "If Tag hadn't shown up, I think it would have been our race," Franchitti said. "When Tag got in front of me, I got into bad air and, after that, it was Pat's race. But it's about time Pat won a race because he's been running really well for a long time."
Franchitti called Tagliani's late burst into the lead group a dangerous move, but Carpentier defended his countryman and teammate, pointing out he was battling Paul Tracy for position and championship points. "I've seen moves in other places that were more dangerous than his move today," Carpentier said. "He was not going to lift the throttle and lose three places." The race was typical of the CART events at Michigan since 1999, when the Handford Device, an aerodynamic pieced fitted to the rear wing to catch the air and slow the cars down for safety, was introduced. With the Handford cutting holes in the air and allowing cars to slingshot past each other almost at will, there were 61 official lead changes at the finish line -- one short of the series record - and a total of 167 on the track in the 500-mile event. The close racing also produced many scary moments but, until the Brack-Papis collision the only accident was a one-car crash by Christian Fittipaldi on lap 215. Fittipaldi also escaped injury. Cristiano da Matta came on at the end to finish fourth, just ahead of Herta, the last driver on the lead lap. Tagliani was sixth, a lap down and just ahead of Tracy, Franchitti's teammate who was among the fastest drivers all day but lost ground because of refueling problems on two pit stops.
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