Nashville Superspeedway
Firestone Indy 200

A.J. IV Survives at Nashville

A.J. Foyt IV and Team Conseco overcame several obstacles in the Firestone Indy 200 at Nashville Superspeedway Saturday night to finish 16th.

Foyt IV‘s problems began early in the race when, unbeknownst to him, his right rear tire began losing air pressure causing handling problems in the Conseco car. A pitstop on lap 35 revealed the right rear tire had a small puncture.

On lap 60, Ed Carpenter crashed in front of Foyt IV. Carpenter wasn't hurt, however, the debris from Carpenter's accident broke the right end fence on the No. 14's rear wing. The wing damage was not apparent when Foyt IV pitted during the ensuing caution. The team was more concerned about the sliced right rear tire (also from debris). Foyt IV received fresh rubber and was on his way. He ran at speed for nearly 20 laps until track observers reported a problem with the rear wing.

The officials brought it to A.J. Foyt's attention and the team owner ordered his grandson to the pits immediately. Foyt told the crew to tear off the piece that had partially separated and young Foyt returned to the action. The pit stop cost him about five to six laps since the ‘fix' happened under green flag.racing.

The track went yellow two laps later and Foyt IV pitted again so Team Conseco could replace the ragged end fence during the caution period. Foyt IV rejoined the race six laps down to the high flying leaders.

Foyt told A.J. IV to drive at a comfortable pace since he could only improve his position through attrition. Even that plan became problematic when the engine quit during a late race caution and the car had to be towed into the pits.

The engineers determined that the same debris that tore the rear wing end fence also tore off the right rear wheel sensor which was linked to the Conseco car's traction control. The traction control program couldn't work properly and it eventually led to the engine problems.

However, Team Conseco didn't give up. They were able to disengage the traction control program so it would no longer interfere in the operation of the engine which was re-fired. Foyt IV was sent out despite losing more laps because of the situation. However, the tenacity paid off as Foyt gained three more positions by staying in the race.

The race turned out to be a real wheel banger as the IRL IndyCar Series staged some of its closest racing of the season. Several cars hit the wall after rubbing their fenderless cars. The most heart-stopping incident occurred when Buddy Rice (who lost his lead on a pit stop) challenged Dan Wheldon for the lead on the lap 176 restart. The two were locked wheel to wheel at nearly 200 mph as they entered turn three. Somehow they both maintained control of their cars (didn't crash out) but the contact knocked Rice's front wings askew and he had to pit for repair.

Wheldon led through that brief caution period only to have his right rear tire blow on the next restart, bringing out another caution. He had gained the lead earlier by not changing tires. The decision proved costly in the end.

Wheldon was able to pit for new tires but both drivers were out of contention. Rice came back to finish sixth and Wheldon ended up 13th.

Tony Kanaan won the race, the seventh victory in eight tries for Honda power. The race was slowed for 54 laps by seven cautions including those for Tomas Scheckter and Bryan Herta, who hit the wall in separate accidents but emerged unscathed. Sam Hornish and Helio Castroneves rounded out the top three.

The IRL IndyCar Series's next event is the A.J. Foyt Indy 225 at the Milwaukee Mile at the Wisconsin State Fairgrounds. The race will be televised live Sunday, July 25th by ABC at 3:30 pm eastern. Earlier that day on ESPN-2, A.J. Foyt IV will be one of the drivers featured in "The Fast Life: An American Story", a one hour special which will air at 12 noon eastern.
 

NOTES & QUOTES: Firestone Indy 200

A.J. Foyt IV: Conseco No. 14 Dallara/Toyota/Firestone


A.J. Foyt IV on Nashville: "Nashville is different from every other track we race on. It's the only track that is concrete and 1.3 miles long, somewhere between a short track and a superspeedway. It will be challenging but I think we've made some gains as a team since Indy and we've run competitively. The car ran strong at Kansas but we had the pitstop problem which hurt us in the results. Still, we've got some positive momentum going and I want to keep it going."

A.J. Foyt and his grandson A.J. IV will both attend the special event being staged by the Oceanic Conservation Organization in downtown Nashville Thursday evening. The group is trying to raise awareness about the ‘race to save the oceans' for future generations. OCO will screen a 30 minute documentary which includes some dramatic footage of blue and white marlin. The footage was captured through use of the National Geographic ‘Critter Cam' and a revolutionary Marlin satellite-tagging device which will be demonstrated by Dr. Jay Rooker.

At the Argent Mortgage Kansas Indy 300: "We had a bad push at the start, but after our first pit stop, the car was handling great," said Foyt IV afterwards. "We ran into more bad luck when the air hose got stuck on our next stop, and we had to pit again, plus take a 10-second penalty. But we didn't give up, and we passed some top cars, so we know we can run with the guys that win races. It was fun." Foyt started 14th, lost several laps on a botched pitstop under green and came back to finish 13th.

At Nashville last year, A.J. IV started 16th and finished 17th. "My car was good in practice during the day but we were off on our nighttime set-up," Foyt IV said afterwards. "From the start of the race, the car had a real bad push which meant I would have to wait before I could put the power down or the car would slide up to the wall. It was a long night and I just tried to hang on and finish the race which we did."

Past performance at Nashville Superspeedway for Foyt's IRL team shows his cars running well in the race but not finishing. In 2002 Airton Dare was leading when he moved high to avoid contact with Sam Hornish who was challenging for the lead. Dare got into the marbles and hit the wall. Eliseo Salazar was running as high as second but a pitstop under green cost him two laps. He eventually crashed out while getting passed by the leader. Greg Ray also crashed after hitting fluid and spinning. In 2001, Donnie Beechler finished 10th and Salazar was credited with 11th after the engine blew on lap 148 of 200.

The Firestone Indy 200 will be televised live Saturday night at 7:00 p.m. eastern time on ESPN.