Andretti

INDIANAPOLIS -- For all intents and purposes, Michael Andretti bumped himself from the Indy 500 field.

Andretti qualified in the 23rd spot last weekend -- only ahead of Billy Boat among cars which qualified -- for the Indy 500, but could have been knocked out of the field had his time been bested during Sunday's Bump Day.

Until the rains came, track conditions were cooler and milder than they had been last weekend during qualifying, allowing for higher speeds.

But those higher speeds also applied to Andretti's backup car, which he drove to the No. 25 spot -- two spots back from where he had been, but much more securely in the field. With more than nine cars vying for spots in the field on Sunday, Andretti and Boat would have been the first cars in danger of being bumped had a 10th or 11th car bested their original qualifying speeds.

This was the impetus for Andretti and Team Green's decision to run the backup car.

"We thought we were going to get bumped, and we knew we had a pretty fast (backup) car, so we thought we had better go out," said Andretti. By attempting to qualify the backup car, Andretti took his previous time -- and spot in the field -- out of the race.

"We had a lot of faith in that car, so we thought we had better go out and do it. We knew we had a vulnerable car there, so we thought we should put the other car in to be safe. We worked on a setup all week. The conditions are so good now. We knew we had to go out."

After making the decision to run the backup car, Andretti, who has led 398 laps at Indy -- tops all-time among drivers who haven't won the Indy 500 -- said he had to put his previous run with the primary car out of his mind.

"To me it was nothing different than where Paul and Dario were," Andretti said of teammates Paul Tracy and Dario Franchitti, who both secured spots in the field on Sunday. "They didn't have a spare car. That's all they had, so I was in the same position (because) I pretty much wrote off that other car.

"My race car wasn't going to stand up, because I didn't think that time was going to stand up, so we just had to go and do it."

As it turns out, Andretti would have remained in the field -- with possible thanks to the rain that cut short the Bump Day madness -- had he stuck with his original qualifying speed of 226.781.

Boat's original speed of 226.589 also held up. But after running faster practice speeds in the backup car, Andretti notched a four-lap average speed of 228.713 in Sunday's qualifying attempt, safely putting him ahead of eight other cars that earned spots on Sunday.

From the back
Getting into the field was only the first step. Andretti will still need to make his way through the field after starting behind 24 other cars on Sunday.

"It's no fun (to start in the back). There's so much turbulence back there. But (I've) been there, done it," said Andretti, who finished third in last year's Indy 500 after starting 21st.

	Michael Andretti requalified for the Indy field in his back-up car.

"I just got to try to stay out of trouble -- be patient in the first part of the race."

Patient, but not too patient. Andretti's not planning to hang back and let everything sort itself out.

"I'm going to be aggressive like I normally am and if the opportunity is there, I'm going for it. And if not, I'll just wait. It's a long race."

Andretti's best finish at Indy came in 1991 when he finished second while driving for Newman-Haas. And despite the widespread opinion that this year's field is the strongest in years, Andretti feels he is still one of the drivers to beat.

"The race is going to be tough -- really, really tough. There's no prediction here. I don't know who's going to be the guy to beat, to be honest. I think we're going to be one of the guys to beat, but I can't pick the other ones. Except my two teammates. They're going to be tough."

The competition level in this year's race can be party attributed to the greater number of CART drivers in the field. But according to Andretti, that's not the only reason.

"I think that's good (that more teams are coming to Indy). It make this race what it's supposed to be. The best in the world here. I think it's becoming that now. You have just about every one of the top teams in CART here and you have the IRL teams which have stepped it up tremendously.

"In my opinion, I think it is the most competitive field ever. ...Look at the (qualifying) speeds -- it's incredible."

Andretti led 16 laps in the 2001 race, his first visit to Indy since the CART-IRL split. And the 39-year-old feels that had it not been for some back luck, he could have brought the car to Victory Lane -- which apparently bodes well for his chances this season.

"I think that last year we had a pretty good race and I feel a little bit better this year than I did last year," said Andretti. "I'm hoping we can have an equal if not better race than we did last year -- but not have all the problems that we had last year with the flat tire and the wing being broken.

"Without those problems, we win the race. Hopefully we just have a trouble-free race with a car that's good and consistent and fast and then we celebrate (on Sunday)."

Teamwork
Andretti's race status was uncertain after sitting on the bubble all week after his mediocre qualifying effort last weekend. But teammates Tracy and Franchitti had to sweat it out until Sunday after failing to qualify in their first attempts.

"I told Dario the first week is normally the worst," said Andretti. "But unfortunately they didn't get in the field so this second week was just as bad. But normally the first week's the pressure-filled week. I said to him, 'Oh, it's going to get better, it's going to get better.' I guess I lied to him a little bit. But now he's in, so he'll be a little more relaxed."

Franchitti and Tracy qualified 28th and 29th, respectively, with times slightly off Andretti's pace. And Andretti insists he expected the trio to all make the field.

"It's such a strong team. There was no doubt in my mind that the three of us were going to be in there. It was a little harder but I think it was true teamwork that got us all three in the field the way we did.

"That would have been tough if one of us hadn't made it -- that would have been a tough situation. These guys have been working their butts off. Doing Indy and then also switching over to Lolas in CART. They're burning the candle on both ends right now. So this will be a big psychological lift for the whole team now. We're not only in the field but we're in strong, which is good."