CART FedEx Championship Series: Grand Prix of Monterey

Topics:  Grand Prix of Monterey

Kenny Brack
Cristiano da Matta
Christian Fittipaldi
June 9, 2002

MONTEREY, CALIFORNIA

MERRILL CAIN: Following today's Bridgestone Grand Prix of Monterrey featuring the Shell 300 we are joined by Christian and our champion, Cristiano, as we await Kenny Brack. We will start out with Christian Fittipaldi, driver of the No. 11 Lilly Toyota Lola Bridgestone. He posted his best finish of the 2002 season and his best ever at Laguna Seca, finishing second today. Best finish since winning the 2000 event at Fontana, it's also his third top-5 effort of the season. Christian, we talked a little bit after the race today, obviously your pits today played a very key role for you, you were able to get out ahead of the competition. Talk about that a little bit and just an overall assessment of your day today.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: My pits were very quick. My crew is doing an excellent job. That's why I think we're P 1 in the pit stop contest right now. And I hope to keep it up until the last race of the season. We're going for 50,000 bucks at the last race of the season. And I would be really happy if I can give that, a million dollars for the race and a million dollars for the championship, to my crew. But I know it's going to be tough. The battle in this series is very hard. Every one right now is thinking the same thing. But we will try at least on the pit stop contest to do our very best. Every one thinks that the pit stops were key today. But they were good, I don't think that they were bad, but in my opinion what was key today was my second stint. When I was in clear air, I managed to run pretty quick. Brack was about 10 or 12 seconds in front of me and when he came into the pits that difference was down to about three seconds. And then he came in about two or three laps before I did and I managed to stay out there on hot tires, still put on some decent laps and I think that was really key.

KENNY BRACK: Well, it's been, it was a good day for us. Our Target Toyota ran good today and it's been running good all weekend, really. I think that like Christian was talking a little bit in here, in the middle of the race we caught traffic so we thought we would pit a little earlier to get rid of that. But when we joined the track again we had traffic again. So I think that was what made Christian get in front of us. He was faster, but I don't know, we may have been able to keep him behind if we would have gotten out in front again. But we will take third. That's a great result for us. That's what we had today. So Newman/Haas team is really strong here and we knew that going in. So we're happy with third.

CRISTIANO dA MATTA: For me it was a perfect day. I was of course worried about the start, as every race had couple of very good guys around me, Kenny and Bruno and Christian and Tony around me, I was a little bit worried about the start, but I managed to get a good start. In the first stint it was quite close, the second stint my car was very very good. I was able to run away. On the third stint I had a little bit of a problem. We tried to make a couple changes in the car or we still don't know what happened, but I lost a couple, I lost some speed in that stint. And also it was a critical moment because at speed that my car was running, not bad but wasn't running great, was my, probably my weakest stint. At the same time I caught traffic. So I caught traffic and I didn't have a lot of performance to get very close and to fight the traffic as well as I should if I had caught any other, in the other stint. So we had to change our strategy a little bit, pit a little earlier because there was a big line of cars in front of me at the second point. And after that, after we pitted again, of course I had to manage to put a couple of quick laps together because I knew Kenny and Christian were still out on the track. So I had to avoid them to put too much advantage on me while I had cold tires. We managed just to go out of the pits ahead of them. And after that, I was pretty comfortable because I think then they, it was their time to catch the traffic and for me it was a little bit easy to control the difference. And my car was back to its performance that it was in the beginning of the race and in the second stint. So I was able to, to be relax a little bit and control the gap a little bit better.

KENNY BRACK: No. (Laughter.) That's hard to say. I think that on speed he was faster than I was, but on the other hand, you know, to pass here is not easy, so I think that my car would have been pretty wide. So who knows, it's hard to say. I don't know.

KENNY BRACK: Well, the second stint for us we made some changes in the first stop. And for the worst I think because we lost about three or four tenths of a second there. That whole stint. But then we, we adjusted back in the last stint. So we were back up to a little better speed there in the end. But you know, it is what it is. You try to do small change, to see if you can improve stuff. And sometimes you do and sometimes you don't.

CRISTIANO dA MATTA: Well motor racing is a team sport. I don't do anything by myself. It's a combination of everything. Of course, we have great chassis, we have a great engine, the team has a very good mechanics. We understand what we need for the road course very well. And probably I'm driving okay too because that is one of these factors. If one is missing, you cannot get any performance out of the car. You're not going to be winning races. To win races we have to have everything right there and that's what Newman/Haas has right now is you finishing one, two today is pretty strong performance for the team. Of course it makes us feel bad about our performance on the ovals, but we are, I believe we're getting closer. In Milwaukee we're already a lot closer. Christian finished fourth in Milwaukee, I was running fifth or six when I had the mechanical problem. So we're getting closer too because we were just so far away at the beginning that we made huge, huge gain from the races but even though we made the huge gain we were so far behind that we're still not up to speed. But we're definitely on the right track and we're getting there. We -- the good thing is we know that Lola chassis is good for ovals we know the Toyota engine is good too. And it's just a matter of working out what the car needs as far as set up. So it's just I think it's just a matter of a little bit more time we're going to be fine with the ovals too.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I tell you, it was boring for you guys, but it was really fun for us in the car. And that is what racing is all about, I think it's about having the quick cars out there and may the quick cars win. And may the slow cars not win. I don't think last year was a fair race where to all due respect like Mack is a great driver, but he started dead last, he didn't pass one car on the track, and he won the race. So if you call that racing, I don't call it racing, I call this racing. But maybe we have a different opinions, I don't know about it.

KENNY BRACK: I'm with Christian too. And I think that the Laguna Seca track it's just because the layout and everything it's very difficult track to pass. It's not anything that has nothing to do with our type of racing or anything. It's just that the straight away here is short. And there is just makes it more difficult to offer take. It's just even when I used to race Indy lites here I remember it was almost impossible to pass. And you watch every other race here it's very difficult to pass. Just something about the track, I don't think it has anything to do with our racing, but as Christian said, I think the race was for us from inside the car was great because we are pushing the maximum all the time you're on the very edge all the time and it's just probably a little bit more complex for the spectators to understand because it's everything is -- sometimes the competition is not on the race track but it's just the lap times, the gaps and everything, it's probably a little bit more adverse for racing sometimes the spectators miss the passing and everything. But there was some close racing too. At least -- at one time I got through big line of six cars that I was behind and they were fighting, fortunately for me, but they were running close. I think that covers it.

CRISTIANO dA MATTA: Well Laguna is always a hard track for tire wear. I was actually surprise that had my tires were able too stay as well as they did throughout the stints. At the very very end of the stint my rear tires start to go away a little bit. But a lot better than my expectations. Because Bridgestone makes a very soft tire and usually the tire wear is high. But I think that the way the temperature helped a little bit. The tires of course are very good and helped even being so soft held up, held up quite well. So I have no concerns about tire wear today.

KENNY BRACK: It was pretty good out there today I think.

KENNY BRACK: I think Portland is maybe a little bit easier to get a run on somebody than Laguna, because at least it's got a pretty big straight line there with the, with an exit on to the straight now where you can have a quite a few different lines. And also it's really a slow corner after the straight, so you have a very heavy breaking zone there. So it's not a lot of overtaking spots on the track, but at least there is one good one.

CRISTIANO dA MATTA: Well if there is, I'm not going to say anything. No, I, it's difficult to say. You say if my grandmother was a man was my grandfather what? So in racing there is no if like it's just the way it happens. It's those things are just impossible to know. And I think my car was pretty strong today. I think you know, if maybe Christian had started closer to me it would have maybe been harder. The race was, I would have more trouble to control the difference I had during the race. But it's, the thing is, you cannot consider if in racing, just it's just the way racing, it happens in a way and after it's done you can't change it.

KENNY BRACK: Well, yeah, I think that, you know, if you look at their performance here, even in the earlier testing and stuff like that at this track, I think that it was no surprise to anybody that they were fast. I think that in spring training I think Cristiano dominated every session here. Ourselves, we were very, very average. So maybe they have improved. But not as much as we have, because we were very average when we were here and now we're at least on the podium, you know, and qualified second. Maybe had a shot at the pole. So we have had a big improvement since spring training. I know the Target team has done a fantastic job improving my car and I hope that -- it wasn't enough for Cristiano and Christian, but it's at least closer and you have to start somewhere. So I think that we are, we know what direction we need to go in and hopefully we can close the gap even more. We intend to make life dreadful for them sooner rather than later.

MERRILL CAIN: Any final questions? Gentlemen, thank you very much for your time today. Congratulations on a great race. We will see you in a week in Portland.