CART MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 21, 1999

Christian Fittipaldi

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Thank you very much.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Well, definitely this first race are not going to be very easy for me, but I still think that we can finish in the Top-5 in the series and still do finish up the season with some three very strong races and hopefully that is going to put me very well in shape for like next year. But I am very confident and the fact that I missed out a little bit definitely that is not going to help me. But I am still very confident and I think that we can do some last three strong races.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Well, I think it was very important for me to be back in the car when I was ready to be back in the car. By no means we are really pushing the issue here like we waited enough and I am ready to go back in the car. If I am ready in time to still do three -- like three races I will do them. If not, if that wasn't the case, I would have waited until like the beginning of next year. But happily enough, for me, it is not really the case. As I have said before, like I am really happy to be back in the car, but this weekend is definitely going to be very busy for me. It is not going to be easy. I know exactly why it is not going to be easy, but I promise you, Steve, that if I finish in the Top-3, I will buy you a cell phone.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: You're welcome.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I wouldn't say I am 100% physically because when you are losing out on driving, no matter how much you do on the other side, it is never the same as driving. I think that I am in pretty good shape, but maybe not 100%. The head definitely doesn't have any problem. I don't have anymore really -- any headaches or I am not seeing double or none of that. All of that was really a bad problem for me on the first two weeks and then it really got better, better and better and I haven't had any headaches now for the past three to four weeks, I would say.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I think racing in general is really, really safe nowadays, especially if you compare it to like 20 years ago, 25 years ago. How safe are the cars? How safe are the tracks? They are never too safe like there is never going to be a point where either the tracks or the cars are oversafe. The only thing that we have to work on is to make them every time safer and safer exactly to avoid what happened like two weeks ago. We can't wait for us to really start reacting and we need to try and make everything, not only the tracks, but also the cars, safer like -- not I would say every time we go out there, but as much as we can and we have to strive for that and I think that is going to make a very big difference in the sport. But coming back to the first part of your question, if you compare it to about 30 years ago, or 25 years ago, there is no doubt that the sport that we do nowadays is like, I would say, almost up to 100 times safer than it was.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I don't know what to say. That is a good question. But I am happy because finally my holiday is finished and I can go back to work. I was starting to get a little bit bored, to be quite honest with you. I am happy to be a part of the next race and, as I said before, I think there are still a few more races to go and we can finish up the season in like on a high note and really get revved up for the next year, but Bob did a great job when I was out and I think both myself and like the whole team is very happy and hopefully we can go well.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Well, I can't say that I am happy because at the time I wasn't there, is no doubt about it that I wasn't. But what can you do? I would rather be -- I am a happier person being over here talking to you and knowing that everything is normal than actually trying to go for the title and then something worse happens like down the road. So I am a happier person talking to you here without the title, that you can be sure. But, by no means, that is definitely my goal. I am still going to fight for that and I know it won't happen anymore this year, but we will see what is really going to happen next year. But going back to the beginning of your question, I was upset; especially in like the first couple of days, there is no doubt about it; especially when it started sinking in that I was going to lose so many races and I know it is already very competitive when you don't lose any race and I knew that the fact that I was going to lose so many races, it was all over for me.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I can understand what Ernie is going through because obviously he is a great driver. He is a little bit older than I am. He has been doing motor racing at that level for a long time. So maybe he fulfilled his racing ambitions and that is why really he decided to stop. Unfortunately this hasn't -- unfortunately not or -- fortunately or unfortunately, depends how you look at it, this hasn't come through my mind yet and I haven't fulfilled my dreams yet. The motivation is still deep inside me and very, very strong. So I have to continue racing. On the other hand, someone came out with some rumors, I don't know from where like one week ago or two weeks ago, I can't remember-I got some phone calls even from San Paolo, Brazil saying that I was going to retire. And I want to keep something very, very clear, the day that I retire you are going to hear from me and everyone is going to hear from me. But they are going to hear it from my mouth and not from what other people say out there. By no means I never thought of really stopping.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Well, definitely the Texaco cars didn't have a great showing last year. (laughs). We were out of the race like -- both cars was about a lap and a half. It was almost a joke. We are highly motivated to change it exactly to the opposite way this year. There is no doubt about it. It is very important race for us and it is really important for myself also because I am coming back and it is our great sponsor and so it is going to be very important for us to finish the race and finish very, very well. But going back to your question, like definitely last year wasn't very impressive at all like the track was great and unfortunately we had a lot of rain when it came down to the race, but when it came down to race time, as far as team-wise is concerned, like the performance wasn't very impressive.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Well, obviously we don't have the dry track race experience that we could have gained last year. And we do carry a lot of that from, for example, like when we go to Portland, from one year to the other, we carry a lot of the previous race experience and unfortunately the only race experience that we have about that track is on wet settings and then eventually going to dry at later stages of the race. But still I think we have a reasonable amount of experience from last year from Friday and Saturday. We are going to build up again this year, so I honestly don't see it as being a huge problem. If it is going to be a problem, it is going to be the same for all the cars out there. There isn't going to be one car that is going to have a small advantage over the others, I don't think so.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Yeah, as I say, taking the webs out of my body and coming back into working mode and going out nice and steady, but competitive all the time. And like I think the team has a very good car on that type of a circuit, so, I think that it will slowly come building up and maybe the first practice we won't set like the whole world on fire and then start building up and go better, better throughout the whole weekend. As long as I go better throughout the whole weekend I am going to be very happy.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I ran yesterday at Sebring.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Yeah, everything went okay. We ran in the wet because it was raining a lot, but everything went okay.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: I think the end of my career or the end of anyone's career is when you are not motivated to drive anymore. As long as you physically can get the job done, I really don't think that way and maybe it is going to be next year, maybe it is going to be like in 15 years from now, I really don't know. But the day I hop into the car and I really don't feel anything when hopping into the car, I am going to stop driving like the same way, like the same day. I really don't have to drive because of other people and I drive because of myself. I love what I do and you can be sure that I am going to stop the same day. As far as getting involved in accidents and eventually having small injuries, there is obviously a big concern for all the drivers because no one is out there to really get hurt. We are out there to try and practice our sport the best way as possible. As far as fear is concerned, I think there isn't one driver out there that doesn't have a little bit of fear. Everyone has fear because if you don't have fear, you can't drive the car to the limit. You would never know when to stop or like when to brake or how quick is too quick. Sometimes maybe when you forget about the fear, you sort of over drive the car and that can put you in a complicated situation.

CHRISTIAN FITTIPALDI: Thank you very much. I will see you guys out there in Houston.