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Chicken or Feathers?
 Racing
can be a very humbling sport. One day it's chicken, the next day it's feathers.
I had a mouthful of feathers in Nashville Saturday night..
It's hard for me to believe, but we wrecked everything we had at Nashville
Superspeedway where the Indy Racing League made its second appearance this past
weekend.
It began with my grandson A.J. Foyt IV crashing in practice on Friday. It was
the first time he had ever seen or driven on a cement track, which is very
tricky for drivers to learn. His car got loose coming off turn two causing him
to spin and back it into the wall. He hit pretty hard but was able to walk away.
His No. 14 Harrah's Dallara/Infiniti needed repairs to the right side
suspension, nose piece and rear wing.
While Jack Starne, my crew chief for many years, put new pieces on A.J. IV's
car, I worked on getting my Harrah's Indy car team up to speed. This weekend
marked Eliseo Salazar's return to the cockpit since his injury April 16th while
testing at the Speedway so I was running a three-car team.
I was happy that Salazar healed faster than doctors predicted but I wasn't
really planning on it when I hired Greg Ray to drive the rest of the season. I
promised Salazar a ride when he was ready to return and I felt I had to field a
car for him as best I could.
I struggled to find comfortable car set-ups for all of my Harrah's drivers. With
cement tracks like Nashville, that's hard to do because these type tracks don't
give a driver the feel he's used to in a race car. It can be very deceiving.
None of my cars qualified very well but for different reasons.
The crew got A.J. IV's car back together with less than five minutes to spare
for qualifying. He had to go out on new tires (not desirable here) and he spun
on his first hot lap. He's getting better though, because this time he didn't
hit anything. He came back to the pits and they allowed him to re-qualify but
just take one lap. But, we had to change his tires first because he'd cut his
right rear. This time he went slower than he practiced but he just wanted to get
it in the show. He qualified 10th.
My trio of Indy car drivers, Eliseo, Airton Dare and Ray qualified 17th, 19th
and 20th. But they all felt confident that the race set-ups would be better.
They were right.
A.J. IV said that the way his Infiniti Pro Series car handled in the race was
the best it had been all weekend. He finished fourth after making some nice
passes. I think I had too much drag on the car so when he got up to the faster
cars, he had nothing for them. I was glad he brought it home in one piece.
In the Indy car race, Salazar paced the Harrah's team in the first part of the
race. He didn't pit with the others on the first yellow which gave him great
track position. He ran as high as second – not bad for a guy on the comeback.
However, the drawback was that he had to pit under green. There were problems on
the stop and he lost even more ground than normal. Then Ray crashed a couple
laps later. It appeared that he slipped out of the groove and headed straight
for the wall in turn four. He radioed in that he felt like something broke. He
said afterwards that he might have cut a tire or hit fluid. In any case, he
wasn't hurt. That accident brought out the yellow and insured that Salazar would
be at least two laps down.
The only one who seemed to be having a good night at that point was Dare who got
faster as the race went on. By lap 80 he was in third behind Sam Hornish and Gil
deFerran and he moved into second when DeFerran pitted early.
Then Salazar crashed in turn 2. He was in a bunch of cars, moved high to let
faster cars go by (he was two laps down) and he hit the wall. He didn't get hurt
but losing two cars in one race is tough, especially with just a week between
races. It meant some long hours for my Harrah's team.
Dare pitted during that caution and his right rear tire was really worn. He was
lucky he pitted when he did. He came out of the pits in third behind Cheever
(who didn't pit) and Helio Castroneves.
Within two laps of the restart, he was leading the field.
I was thinking this may turn out to be an alright weekend after all.
Airton led nine laps when Hornish dove underneath him. Unfortunately, Dare's
spotter didn't anticipate the move and Dare was startled. He moved up so he
wouldn't hit Hornish, but Hornish didn't give him any room. In fact, Hornish was
half a lane up. Dare tried to hang on but he was in the gray area that bit so
many other cars that night. He slid up and hit the wall in turn two. He didn't
get hurt.
If there is a bright side, it's that we found a good race set-up and the
Harrah's cars were looking good for a while with both Salazar and Dare running
in the lead pack. My grandson told my Indy drivers, if they were going to crash,
they should do like him--crash in practice, not in the race.
Two weeks ago, I was two for two in the win column, a Harrah's double jackpot.
This weekend I was three for three in the loss column. Busted in a big way.
When I do something, I do it big. Just part of being a Texan. But we also fight
hard til the end, so we'll be at Michigan with three Indy cars (and one Infiniti
Pro Series car) ready to go.
It's time for that luck to change the other way. I'm ready to eat some chicken,
mesquite style.
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