RICHMOND, Va. -- He passed at least 60 cars during the evening (which is impressive considering only 22 started the race), lost control in Turn 2 and again in Turn 4 but made a save and avoided the wall both times. His suspension and front wing were damaged in the first pit stop and twice he was at the back of the pack on restarts.

Sam Hornish Jr. wasn't the winner of Saturday night's Indy Racing League SunTrust Challenge, but once again he was the show.

The two-time IRL champion gave the predominantly NASCAR fans a driving display to remember as he started third, dropped back to 16th and charged all the way to fourth place when rain brought a premature halt to the race.

Much like he did in his fifth-place run two weeks ago at Pikes Pike (Colo.), Hornish hustled through traffic and overcame his horsepower deficit with several dazzling outside passes on this ¾-mile bullring known as Richmond International Raceway.

"This is a driver's track and that kid is a helluva driver," said Pancho Carter, a former open wheel star who has been Hornish's spotter the past three years and doesn't readily pass out praise. "He handled everything that was thrown at him tonight."

In a season dominated by Toyota and Honda, Hornish has had to deal with the reality that his Chevrolet engine is a liability. It's anywhere from 25 to 40 horsepower behind those Japanese manufacturers and not even someone with Sam's savvy and ability can make that up.

But on handling tracks like Colorado and Richmond he can make a difference.

"We had a really good car tonight and 95 percent of the time I do with these guys and we're doing the right things on the race track," said Hornish, who incredibly has yet to lead a lap of competition in 2003.

"But we haven't had the best of luck in the pits this year and it's kind of one thing or another."

Exiting his pit box on the first round of stops, Hornish hit Felipe Giaffone, who was pulling into his own pit.

	Hornish overcame pit road trouble to get back into the top-five.

"I got waved, I couldn't see Giaffone and we bumped wheel to wheel," he explained. "It bent my right front tie rod and the front wing a little bit. I asked what that would do to the car and they told it would make it push a little more which isn't what we needed.

"It took a little balance away but we still managed to run pretty fast."

The track only had one groove except for Hornish, who was the only guy to make the outside line work with any consistency.

"It's fun passing people and I try to do whatever is necessary without wrecking the car," he continued. "I would have liked to run those last 44 laps and see if I could have caught them (Gil de Ferran and Helio Castroneves, second and third).

"I don't know if we had anything for Scott (Dixon, the winner) because he was really fast all night. But we'll keep trying to win one of these and sooner or later we're going to get there."

At 22, Hornish is at a crossroads of his career. He was a tremendous value for the Pennzoil Panther team three years ago and they blossomed together. But that team can't pay Hornish what he's worth anymore.

Roger Penske could and Hornish has the perfect profile for The Captain: he's humble, polite, classy and really good. It will probably be up to Penske to keep him in the IRL, although Tony George needs to make sure he doesn't end up being plucked by NASCAR (specifically Dale Earnhardt Inc.).

Hornish is the embodiment of what the IRL was supposed to be about: a young American who only had a helmet and ability (although his dad helped him get started in 2000 with a low budget team). He's the most exciting thing about the all-oval series and is building a fan base around the country.

	“	I don't know if we had anything for Scott because he was really fast all night. But we'll keep trying to win one of these and sooner or later we're going to get there. ”
		— Sam Hornish Jr.

One IRL official said Sam wondered what next year's schedule looked like in June because he's getting married -- and that's a positive sign. Plus, he still wants to win the Indianapolis 500. And, he loves open wheel cars.

"Indy was kind of disappointing this year but I think we showed people what kind of team this is," said Hornish, who has maintained his cool all year and not put the hot lip on Chevrolet once. "You know, it's still good because I never thought I had the talent to drive Indy cars.

"And even a bad day in an Indy car beats working at McDonald's."

Before this kid is through, he'll probably own a couple of McDonald's.

Chevy-Cosworth update
Just about everyone is finally admitting the normally-aspirated Cosworth IRL engine was, indeed, five or six mph faster than Chevrolet in its initial track test two weeks ago at Chicago but nobody is prepared to predict when and if it will replace the downtrodden General Motors powerplant.

"It's a long way from being done," said IRL vice president of competition Brian Barnhart when asked if the IRL was going to OK the Cosworth for the five Chevy teams. "GM is going to ask for some durability runs and, by the time that takes place, I'm not sure how realistic it's going to be because of the time element.

"GM is between a rock and a hard place, we know that."

A Cosworth insider said that if and when his company was officially signed up to supply Hornish, Sarah Fisher, Robbie Buhl, Buddy Rice, Vitor Meira and Buddy Lazier with engines it would be close to two months from now.

Steve Shannon, executive director of GM Marketing Services, issued a statement Saturday: "GM Racing and Chevrolet are ardently investigating opportunities to improve the Chevy V8 in the IRL. GM acknowledges an active exploration of opportunities with non-GM partners, but will not comment on specifics until a signed contract is in place."

There was a Chevy owners meeting here on Friday and it was voted/decided that whatever decision was reached regarding motors, nobody would be given preferential treatment.

"When someone presents an alternative, it will be a unified roll out," said Barnhart.

Naturally, the irony of this whole scenario is that Ford owns Cosworth and has always been Chevy's No. 1 rival. The Chevy owners also reportedly agreed that nobody would refer to this engine as a Cosworth.