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 Friday, December 13, 2002
It's now just Sam vs. Helio
By Jack Arute
Special to ABC Sports Online
As many predicted, the Indy Racing League title chase comes down to the final race of the season this Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway (ABC, 3 p.m. ET). Unlike what most expected though, it will in essence be a two-car chase.
Two-time CART champion Gil de Ferran will not compete in the Chevy 500 after suffering a concussion and a hairline fracture of his left wrist during the Delphi Indy 300 on Sunday at Chicagoland Speedway. That means that it will be a 'mano-y-mano' battle between Gil's Marlboro Team Penske teammate, Helio Castroneves, and defending IRL champ Sam Hornish Jr. and the Pennzoil Panther pack.
|  | | By winning last week, Hornish comes into the final race with a 12-point edge. |
Both will have teammates to help them with the Texas draft. Hornish added rookie Dan Wheldon to his team at Chicagoland and the former Toyota Atlantic star responded by finishing 10th.
De Ferran's seat will find Max Papis at the controls, giving Castroneves the needed dance partner to draft with.
Hornish took a 12-point advantage over Castroneves by winning the Chicagoland event in the closest Indy racing finish in history. With the Chevy 500 set for the 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway, no one would be surprised to see that mark fall. The Chicagoland finish eclipsed the previous closest margin set in June at TMS.
Don't expect Hornish to drive any harder than he has all season. Saving his "best" for the last race is not his style.
"I put my best out on the line at Indianapolis and finished 25th, put my best out on the line in Kansas and finished second, third at a couple other places," Hornish said after his Delphi Indy 300 win. "I know that the team puts 100 percent into it, and they always put their best out on the racetrack, and it wouldn't be fair to them if I didn't. So every race I go out there ... sometimes it gets me in trouble and sometimes like today, it works out good for us ... whether or not we hit it at the right point in time. "
While Hornish was the quickest right off the trailer, Castroneves' Marlboro crew worked all weekend to keep him in the points chase. The two-time Indy 500 champ had a miserable qualifying effort -- 21st, his worst career IRL start -- but used the draft and quick pit stops to advance to a fourth-place finish.
"I owe this finish to great work by my Marlboro Team Penske crew. If it weren't for them, I would have finished much farther back," Helio explained after the race. "We had fantastic pit stops all day, which helped me gain valuable track position. The car was handling really well in traffic, and I was flat-out, but we just didn't have what it took to win."
Texas accentuates the draft and flat-out racing. Some of the IRL's most incredible finishes have taken place at Texas, including last year's Chevy 500 finish that saw Hornish cap off his championship run with a last lap squeeze play that gave him the win.
"We'd like to say, yeah, we are going to go in there and win the race, and we're going to lead from start to finish, but it's not likely that that's going to happen," said Hornish. "We are going to have people in there, and it's just going to be staying out of trouble and strategy."
That strategy includes pit stops and pit box position. At Chicagoland, Castroneves enjoyed the last pit box before re-entering the track, because he was the point leader at the time of the race. On several stops, that enabled him to get out ahead of Hornish who had the third box from the pit out area. This time Hornish has the first box (and the advantage) with Castroneves right behind him. Where Wheldon and Papis situate their pit boxes will also come into play.
Castroneves has not surrendered. He finished fourth at TMS in June and thinks his team has improved since then.
"I've never won a national championship," remarked Castroneves. "This would be a great goal to accomplish. Marlboro Team Penske has been doing a fantastic job all year, so now we just have to stay focused for one more race and execute this weekend."
So, who will win the Texas 500? Hornish and Castroneves are not the only candidates. You must include Jeff Ward, the June TMS winner, and Al Unser Jr., who was runner-up at both Texas and Chicagoland.
What it comes down to though, is the race for the championship -- Hornish's title -- that Sam does not want to relinquish.
"I know all I've got to do is go out there, drive the car, and if I do the right thing on the day, then that's good," he said. "If I don't, then I've got to think about it until next March."
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 Sam Hornish Jr. joins ESPN's John Kernan on RPM2Night.
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN | T1
Sam Hornish Jr. joins ABC's Jack Arute following his seventh IRL win.
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN | T1
Sam Hornish Jr. edges Al Unser Jr. by .0024 for the victory at Chicagoland.
RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN | T1
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