Vasser

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- One is a former CART champion who remains in the Champ Car series in 2003. The other leaves his open-wheel roots behind in 2003.

Although Jimmy Vasser and Christian Fittipaldi were both running stock cars at Daytona last week, each still had thoughts on the future of CART as the series moves forward from its defections over the past two seasons.

Vasser will run Champ Cars in 2003 with Stefan Johansson's new American Spirit team, with fellow American Ryan Hunter-Reay as a teammate. But a full-time Busch Series ride for 2003 wasn't out of the question for the 1996 CART champion.

"There were some potential deals for a full season," said Vasser, who still plans to run at least 10 Busch races with Braun Racing this season. "Whether they could have come together or not remains to be seen. But the deal came to the front with Stefan Johansson's team in CART and I felt like that was the best thing for me."

Vasser qualified fifth for last Saturday's Koolerz 300 Busch race at Daytona International Speedway and was making a move for the fifth spot with just two laps remaining in the race when Todd Bodine got into the back of Vasser and wrecked him. Vasser was credited with a 28th-place finish.

But with his first stock car foray of the year behind him, Vasser's focus now moves to this weekend's Champ Car World Series season opener at St. Petersburg, Fla., where the 37-year-old will be the only former series champ in the field.

"It's probably better that I am there than I'm not. I don't know how important it is at the end of the day," Vasser said.

Former series champ Michael Andretti left for the Indy Racing League following the 2002 season, while '02 champ Cristiano da Matta made his way to Toyota's Formula One effort.

"But not only am I a past champion, I'm one of the only two Americans," Vasser said. "The other one is my teammate. I think it's kind of cool that our team is called American Spirit racing. I think there should at least be representation from our home country, you know? I'm proud of that. I'm looking forward to it. I think it was more important to have me there than to not have me there."

The series will eventually have to live life without Vasser, who has his sights set on becoming a full-time Winston Cup driver in the next few years. But Vasser is optimistic about the series' long term future.

"I think it's definitely on a course for looking better. It's not looking worse anymore," said Vasser, who at Fontana, Calif., and finished tied for sixth in points last season. "Cars are coming in. There's new blood, new faces, new excitement. I just don't think there's any more negative you can write about CART. Everything that's happening now is positive."

Those positives include the inclusion of himself and Hunter-Reay. And while CART's top league is an international series, more than half of the series' races are held in the United States, meaning having some sort of American representation in the series is important.

So is it at all surprising that Johansson's American Spirit team sports the only two Americans in the series, especially with accomplished drivers such as Alex Barron and Memo Gidley always searching for rides?

"Yeah, I am a bit (surprised). I think they've shown great talent and speed and consistency. Even (Max) Papis. He's not an American, but he's looking for a ride, too," Vasser said. "It's just a difficult time. We'll all weather through it. It's up and down. I think so many negative things have been said about CART and a lot of negative things have happened that really there isn't anything more negative that you can write. Now, it's all positive.

"The plane was crashing to the ground and somehow they've pulled up. They didn't crash. I think they're gaining altitude again."

Farewell, Fittipaldi

	Fittipaldi

Christian Fittipaldi's legendary uncle Emerson makes his return to CART this season as a team owner. But the younger Fittipaldi leaves the series to run a stock-car schedule consisting of Winston Cup, Busch and ARCA races in 2003 to prepare for a 2004 Winston Cup rookie campaign with Petty Enterprises.

Fittipaldi, who finished 35th in Sunday's rain-shortened Daytona 500 while driving for Andy Petree Racing, said he hasn't been keeping himself too abreast of what was happening in his former series.

"Not that closely," said Fittipaldi, who finished fifth in the CART standings last season. "I've been looking and I've spoken to people, especially from my team a little bit here and there, but not really that closely."

Despite no longer being part of the series, Fittipaldi shares Vasser's optimism regarding CART's future. "Yeah. I think they are (going to be OK)," he said. "Everything is going fine. It's going to be hard the next two years for them, I imagine. But they're pretty strong. They have some good people behind it and I think they're going to come out of this difficult period."

Fittipaldi's 2002 Newman-Haas teammate da Matta dominated the series last season, winning seven races and running away with the title. But despite both da Matta and Fittipaldi leaving the team and the series, Fittipaldi still thinks the 2003 Champ Car champion could come from the Newman-Haas stable.

"I don't know exactly, but more than likely it's going to be I think a Newman-Haas car or one of the two Player's cars," he said. "They are the four strongest cars in the series right now."

Newman-Haas is campaigning cars for '03 title favorite Bruno Junqueira and highly-touted rookie Sebastien Bourdais. Junqueira won two races for Chip Ganassi last season and finished second in points. Player's, meanwhile, will have cars for Paul Tracy (11th) and Patrick Carpentier (third).

But according to Fittipaldi, those aren't the only drivers who have a shot at the CART crown.

"(If) I have to bet on a wild card I would say Michel Jourdain. He's been around in the series a long time. He has the experience. He doesn't have the wins, but he has the experience, he has a good group of guys behind him. And last year, even though he didn't have one podium finish, he was up there until the very end of the championship. He got shuffled out of the top six right at the very end -- in the last two or three races."

Jourdain finished ninth in points last season but was just nine points behind Vasser and Kenny Brack, who tied for sixth.

"If it wasn't for (those crashes), I would say Jourdain is definitely the dark horse. Apart from that, it's either Player's or the Newman-Haas cars."

Aside from sharing his insights last week on the 2003 CART Champ Car World Series season, Fittipaldi was also preparing for the Daytona 500. And while he and Vasser were both trying to make the transition from open wheel machines to stock cars at Daytona, the duo weren't exactly trading notes.

"I haven't bumped into him yet," Vasser said after Busch qualifying. "My pass is a Busch Series garage pass. It won't get me in to the Winston Cup garage. So unless he comes over here to visit me -- I can't get over there to visit him.

"But I've had my hands full. I've had opportunities to talk with some more guys who are a lot more experienced than Christian, so I'm really not interested what Christian has to say," said Vasser, laughing.