CART MEDIA CONFERENCE

June 8, 1999

Paul Tracy

PAUL TRACY: Thank you.

PAUL TRACY: Well, I was just on a call with my engineer, Tony Cicale right before we started the teleconference, and we were talking about that. I don't think he feels that we really don't need to do anything different than what we've been doing so far this year. We've been consistent. We've been patient. Been trying to wait for the right opportunity, and we've had some things not go our way. So, really, we are just -- kind of keep trying to do what we've been doing, and hopefully we can continue with good success. Like I said, we've been competitive all year. We've now had two podiums. We need to just be consistent to try to pile on some points and get some better finishes if we can.

PAUL TRACY: Well, definitely. I think now, you know, 20 points is a big weekend. We've got an opportunity. I mean, if we get consistent and start finishing the races consistently, which has been our goal all along, we're in the points race. I mean, we're only 40 -- 40 points out, around there. Moved up in the championship pretty nicely with one race. If we can continue that, then we'll put ourselves into position to be looking strong towards the end of the season, which is our goal. You know, I think we have a good opportunity.

PAUL TRACY: I know that I've put in a lot of effort, and the team has put in a lot of effort, and we haven't -- since I joined the team, we haven't gotten a lot out of it. We never gave up. I never gave up. Sometimes it's easy to just kind of bury your head in the sand. But I think our goal is just that -- you know, try to keep swimming our way out of the quicksand, and sooner or later we're going to get on to the higher ground. That's been our goal all along. I think with hard work and dedication, we've been able to do that. A lot of teams would have given up, and drivers given up, and maybe gone and done something else.

PAUL TRACY: I've been trying to change that this year. I don't think I have the best car out there on the weekends, but I think we had the best -- we had the best strategy and the best plan throughout the race. A lot of times, that's the key to win races. It's not just really about having the fastest car. I think if we can continue what we've been doing this year and get some luck going our way, consistency will come. In years past, when I was with Penske, there was only certain tracks that in the last couple of years where the car seemed to work really well, and your window of opportunity really was only at a few places. And in '97, I was able to capitalize on that, but really struggled the rest of the year. I think with what we have on our team, we have a consistent package. Our goal is to just, you know, try to be more consistent.

PAUL TRACY: Greg and Patrick and I, we get along pretty well. Greg and I get along pretty well. And his engineer, he is also Canadian. We try to hang out a little bit. Coincidentally, Greg, after the race, asked me if he could borrow my rental car and said he'd take it back for me. I hope he did. He gave me a ride to the airport and said, "I need to borrow your rental car for a couple days." And I said, "Well, you'd better." So yeah, we get along well.

PAUL TRACY: Not really. In the off-season, our season is so busy. And usually the off-seasons are just really dedicated to my wife and my family, mostly. Just spending time with them, because my wife, I drag her around all over the country and all over the world for seven, eight months of the year. And in those four months, it's time to really just do the things that she wants to do and the things we need to do around the house. Really, just kind of get away from the motor racing a little bit, as much as I can in between testing. We're still pretty busy with the testing and all that. But it's really just time at home.

PAUL TRACY: It's hard to put your finger. My closest, closest friends are people from high school and things like that. But the guys that I hang out with are, you know, obviously Dario and I hang out with Greg, and Vasser. Jimmy lives here in Vegas; so we spend a lot of time on the same flights with each other and talk pretty regularly.

PAUL TRACY: I worked a long time at testing. That was my first contract was a testing contract for Penske. I look at it as: I love driving a race car. And any time that I'm able to get in the race car, I love to be in it. You know, a lot of guys, they don't want -- they just want to come to race weekends and do their thing. But for me to go out and test and try different things, I love doing it. And when I get in the car, I give hundred percent all day long, whether it's a race or chance for practice or whatever. I think Barry enjoys that. Engineers enjoy that. Because when we do to a two-day test, they are going to get two solid days out of me; not one-and-three-quarter or one-and-a-half, busy making phone calls and things like that. I'm there to test, and I want to learn about the car and find out what works and what doesn't work.

PAUL TRACY: Thank you.

PAUL TRACY: I don't think so. Obviously, Dario has done a tremendous job. He's won some races last year, and he's been very, very consistent this year. You know, he's been finishing on the podium virtually -- virtually every weekend. But I know how much effort that I've put in and how much effort he's put in -- put both of us and both of our cars in a position to do that. I don't think that Dario could have done it without my help, and I could not have won the race this weekend without his help in terms of getting the car set up. I didn't go to test in Milwaukee, and Dario did the test, and he set the car up. And I came and we ran the car the way that he did the test, and I was really happy with the car all weekend. It takes teamwork. And sure, sure we're competitors and we both want to beat each other, but I've been doing this long enough and I've had some pretty high-profile teammates Emerson, and Michael Andretti and Mario that I kind of know what it's like to be overshadowed once in awhile.

PAUL TRACY: I think -- maybe. But, you know, I was thrust into a really high-profile team with high-profile teammates. You know, I guess I've gotten used to that. If a guy outruns you, you know, he's not the only guy on the track that -- from my standpoint, Dario is not the only guy on the track that I need to worry about.

PAUL TRACY: I feel really good about the car on the road courses. I felt through the winter that our weak point -- if we had a weak point on the team, it was on the short oval where the team -- generally, we struggled lasted year with the way it was setup, both Dario and myself, and we weren't totally, totally confident that we were out of the woods this year. Felt a lot better about our road course package, or we tested better throughout the winter. And throughout the spring, the tests that we've done, we've been very, very happy with the road course package. I feel good about going into the road course, and I think we have a really great shot at the next four or five races as a team.

PAUL TRACY: That's a track that we go to that's very, very high speed. We run very little down-force. Some quite fast technical corners; so obviously, you need the car to work mechanically because you have very little down-force on the car. Dario and I both tested there, and we both went really, really quick. We're looking, myself, anyway, I'm looking forward to getting out there, because I feel like I've got a good chance to win there, and I feel good about it.

PAUL TRACY: I was really excited, obviously. And I was talking to my engineer Tony, about it just a minute ago. He said, "You looked pretty tired when you got out of the car." I said, "I really wasn't that tired, but mentally, I was pretty drained." You know, it's been so long since I've gotten into the winner's circle, and the last, you know, 15 laps, when I knew that we were in position to win, I was concentrating so hard and thinking about what I needed to do and not making any mistakes and worrying about everything that could go wrong. And the last 15 laps of the race was just mentally exhausting. And I guess since I haven't won -- I've won a lot of races, but it's been a while since I've won a race, and it's almost like winning your first one again. It's just exhausting. After the race, I was just -- just kind of you, know, relieved and tired, excited, and kind of everything all at once, you know.

PAUL TRACY: That's hard to put your finger on. My guys have worked really hard the last couple years. My crew guys were the team for Penske; so they haven't won a race since '95 or '96. I think both. We kind of both -- everybody on the team needed it as much as anybody else. I don't think there was any one person that needed a victory.

PAUL TRACY: We have had a lot of bad luck go our way and a lost misfortune. Now that I feel like we have in a weight lifted off -- I feel like I have had weight lifted off my shoulders. Little bit more relaxed and a little bit more comfortable. That doesn't mean -- you know, I was talking to my wife: "You know, you live, and it seems like you carry -- the bad things that happen always tend to stick out in your mind." Winning the race was great, but I was really happy for a couple of hours, and then right after that, I started thinking about what I needed to do, you know, to win Portland. So the moments seem to last very short for wins, and things that happen badly, they seem to carry on for a while in your memory. Now that we've got this win, it kind of erases a lot of bad things, and it kinds of has lifted a weight off everybody's shoulders.

PAUL TRACY: I just have supreme confidence in his ability as a race car engineer. We don't really have a lot of stuff that's that different on the car. But, you know, I believe in him, and he believes in me. And he's able to pull things out of me and question me in a lot of ways. And we're able to just -- he's able to generate more out of me, and I'm able to give him more. And we just kind of feed off of each other. It's more productive than any engineer that I've ever worked with before. It's a really good feeling.

PAUL TRACY: Thank you.

PAUL TRACY: I think so. Like I said, I don't think we had the fastest car for outright speed. I think we were -- at certain points of the race, we led, and I showed that we were as fast as everybody. But we really had made a decision right after that second stop that, you know, looking at the tires from the first stop and the fuel, when the car was rich, we leaned for a few laps and engineers figured out: Hey, we can do this without stopping again if we get on the ball right now. And they radioed me and told me that -- to go fully in and try to save as much fuel as I could, because they thought we could do in one stop. And if not, if it went yellow, then we'd be pitting and we'd have more fuel than other people, and that might get us out in front. If we weren't going to make it, if it went yellow and we did a pit stop, we'd be paying with more fuel than everybody, and that only gives you a quicker -- takes less time to put fuel in the car. And we might be able to get out in front of everyone, and that would put us in a lead for a sprint at the end. So our strategy was kind of twofold. Our goal was to try to go to the end, but if we don't, try to save as much fuel as we could so we could beat the other guys out of the pit. You know, it was really just playing it smart and listening to the team and them telling me if I was not making the mileage; or if I was, just try and do the best that I could.

PAUL TRACY: I think that, like I said, we've got a really good road course car. Portland is a fuel-mileage race and a tire-wear race because of the down-force level that we run. So really, just conserving tires and saving as much fuel as we can and not having to make that extra stop. Again, it's going to be important there.

PAUL TRACY: It really kind of varies race to race, depending on traffic, depending on conditions that you're running in. But, you know, we have people from our engineers from Honda that are watching everything that's going on. We have our own engineers on the team. And obviously, you know, they are the ones that really have a closer eye on what's going on. And they relay the information to Tony and Barry. And it's really their decision to make the gut call on what to do, whether we're going to try to do it in one stop or two stops or whatever. But it's really the Honda engineers and our telemetry engineers that really figure out what's going on with the car lap to lap, corner to corner; so, they are much more in tune with what's happening.

PAUL TRACY: Obviously, the helmet is a big deal. But I was talking to Barry about this the other day. And I've always done my pit stops in the past -- at least when I was in Penske, we never put the car on the ground until the fuel was done. When the fuel guy pulled out, the vent and air jet would pull -- leave at the same time. And that really eliminated you from really going anywhere, and that's typically how I had done it all typically in the past. And now, a lot of teams are letting the car on the ground, and you're in gear; and, you know, the fuel guy is still in. So, you're on the ground in gear, and something goes wrong with the clutch or your foot comes off with the clutch and you're leaving; whereas, if you're in the air, you're not going to go anywhere. And I think it might be a good idea -- I talked to Barry about that, making it mandatory that you're not allowed to put the car on the ground until the fuel is done. And that would eliminate the guy from going anywhere, because your wheels are just going to spin in the air, and it would eliminate guys from getting run over.

PAUL TRACY: I really don't know too much about this. You really have to look at the possibility where he could put it. There was a lot of stuff going on inside the tub, wiring and stuff like that. You know, I'm not the person to ask about another location where we could put that kind of stuff, but I'm sure there is. And anything that we can do is a benefit for everybody.

PAUL TRACY: Thank you.

PAUL TRACY: I think so. It didn't really take us long -- long at all to really get together. I mean, I had never worked with him before, but obviously, I know what he has done in the past, and I know who he has worked with in the past, and I know how many championships he has won; so, I have a high regard for him. And it's vice versa. He's only watched me from the start and watched the races that I've won, and he likes racing-type of drivers, aggressive drivers. He's worked with Michael before, and Mario. He was with them for a long time. Obviously, Jacques, he won the championship with Jacques; so he likes that aggressive style of driving. You know, he was -- he was very keen to work with me. So I think there was mutual respect back and forth, and really, it doesn't didn't -- there was no -- we just kind of got off on the right foot, you know, right away personally. And I think that's what really helps us, you know, on the racetrack on a race weekend.

PAUL TRACY: We had about two quarts of fuel left. And there was none in the tank and there was like a trap door where the fuel pick-up is. There was just two quarts of fuel in the pick-up area.

PAUL TRACY: I don't think so. For us, it's a different type of a sport. It's not such an individual sport. I mean, we've got a whole team to support. We've got race cars to buy. You know, without the support of the sponsors, none of that would be possible. You know, from my standpoint, I mean, our cars, at least on Barry's team, they are not really littered with a lot of different sponsorship names. He's got his one major sponsor is KOOL and Brown Williamson. And we have a lot of other -- paramount of smaller sponsors, but you see a lot of cars and Winston Cup cars that are just littered with names. And Barry likes the car to look pretty clean and well-organized looking. And we've got the budget from a small amount of sponsors that we need to do the job, but without those sponsors, he would not be in business. I think for any team, they have got to try and raise the money to be able to -- provide entertainment; and without that funding, it would not happen.

PAUL TRACY: I did watch Indianapolis Robby Gordon and I are pretty good friends, and I was pulling for him. I was really bummed out for him that he did not win the race. On Sunday, with our race, I was thinking of Robby when he ran out of fuel, and I thought I was going to run out of fuel. I thought: Oh, this is going to be the same deal, because I didn't think we were going to make it on fuel for the end of the race. But we did. That's a huge race, and I think that you ask any racing driver in the world if he wanted to race in Indianapolis, I'm sure that a hundred percent of them would say yes. I'd be lying if I said that I didn't. I've done it in the past, and I'd like to do it again.

PAUL TRACY: We discussed it on Thursday. I was testing all week and didn't really have an opportunity, you know. He was doing some media stuff and didn't have an opportunity. Our schedules were kind of conflicting to get a hold of each other, and he came over to my box and we sat down and talked, and he apologized about what happened. And we just kind of decided that we can't really have things like that happen. But, you know, it happened. We can't change what happened. And I think we've gotten to this situation because we both worked together so well and we both -- always on the same page trying to make the car better. And we've gotten both cars competitive within the team. That's pretty rare, really, when you see both cars that close on the grid a lot of the time and you know, running that close together. We've done that because of teamwork. But in the future, it's really Barry's call what are we going to do if we're running first and second, and one guy is breathing down the other guy's neck. It's really going to have to be Barry's call to what's going to happen.

PAUL TRACY: Well, our past track record has not been good; so I think, you know, we've call kind of decided that it needs to be a team decision. And that's best for the team. One day, it's going to be good for one guy, and another day it's going to be good for the other guy. That's kind of the way we're going to run it.

PAUL TRACY: Oh, definitely. Every possible scenario same into my mind. I don't know if you heard earlier that I had all these -- mentally, I was exhausted after the race, with just all of the things: If I had enough fuel and not make any mistakes. And I thought we had to restart, and then I had a good restart, and it went yellow. And it was exactly like Montana: I was in first and Greg was in second. Just all these scenarios going through my mind. Sure, I thought about it. That was, you know, a big mistake that basically cost me a million dollars in prize money. I felt that we had the race in hand, and I just did not want to make -- have that happen again.

PAUL TRACY: No. We had three wins in '97. We weren't married at the time, but we were together.

PAUL TRACY: Oh, she was just ecstatic. She was ecstatic the first three wins. I think it was kind of a -- probably a little bit tougher for her, because when we first got together, the first three races that she came to, I won three in a row. And I think she thought: Oh, this is pretty easy. And then, you know, it's been pretty tough for her the last year and a half, two years, not having a win. And the disappointment, she takes it harder than I do. And to get that win there in Wisconsin; and that's where she was born and that's where her family lives, her aunts and uncles, all her cousins, they were all at the race. It's a special day for her as well.

PAUL TRACY: Yeah.

PAUL TRACY: Thank you.