INFINITI PRO SERIES: DELPHI 100

September 8, 2002

Aaron Fike

Arie Luyendyk, Jr.

Tom Wood

AARON FIKE: I've been running a lot of different series this year, so but I have been keeping busy. I just wanted to finish every race that we went out there and ran, but it didn't happen. We got caught up in a couple wrecks and just had a few problems. So, this victory is definitely sweet.

ARIE LUYENDYK, JR.: I don't know. I've tried everything. No, this is probably the first second place where I've ever been disappointed after a race. I led so many laps today and thought I had it after that restart, but Aaron's car was definitely working good on the high side and he surprised me a little bit. So congratulations to you and your team for doing a great job. Hopefully at Texas we can get a win. I think I've led three races and finished second four out of the five times I've finished. It's a little frustrating, but it's good for the championship and closing in on Foyt and hopefully we can win this thing.

ARIE LUYENDYK:,JR.: Definitely. We have points for leading the most laps today and that helped. All it takes is a little misfortune on his behalf and his team and a good result for us and it could -- fortune could swing my way, I guess.

TOM WOOD: We were hoping for a little closer race. It was a lot of fun. I stuck with Arie the whole time. We kind of worked together the whole way , it's too bad. Congratulations to them, they did a great job. He came on like gangbusters at the end. You know, we got Texas next. I think we should have a lot of fun there, too.

RON HEMELGARN: It really is. It's exciting, obviously, to win. We've had a lot of hard times this year. We had crashes we had not prepared for, mechanical problems we had not prepared for. But to pull off a win, that's great. The racing, I've never seen anything like it. In the 25 years I've been around these type of cars, I've never seen racing like we've had today here, Indy cars and also the Pro Series, everybody is leading. There's 15 cars running for the win for this race, and then it was 11 for the Indy car race. And I've got to say, it's got to be the tires, the Firestone tires, they are just unbelievable to grip. What can you say? It's very, very tight racing. When you go three abreast in the corner, you'd better hope those tires stay under you. So hats off to Firestone.

ROGER JOHNSON: No, actually this is much more than I anticipated. Because when something like this starts up, there's a lot of start-up anticipation problems, generally speaking, the racing is a little bit ragged. Anybody that watched this race today cannot be more enthused about what took place. Drivers from all spots are able to come for the win. I'm really thrilled to have a USAC driver up there winning, and we participate and promote in that series ourselves and every one of these guys are racing hard and looking good. It's real early in this program but this kind of racing is great.

AARON FIKE: I think you'll see that next week, too, in Texas. This racing it's a spec car -- the Indy car race was phenomenal and this race was phenomenal. Any of the top six guys could have won the race. Me and Arie were lucky enough to be up front there. I was definitely worried about him. I was looking in my mirror the whole time, my dad wasn't saying anything to me, and he's my spotter, so I didn't -- I mean it was just phenomenal, the week we've had here. I've had such bad luck -- not just bad luck, just things go wrong and not my way, and this victory is just really sweet.

ARIE LUYENDYK, JR.: I think there was like eight to go when I was behind Aaron, maybe ten to go or so. But he was telling me, you know, just stay in line and stay behind him because A.J. tried to pass me on the outside before that last -- or after the yellow, I'm not sure, and had moved him all the way back on the field. And it was just important to stay in line and time your pass correctly because if you didn't make it, then you were being shuffled back. He told me just to stay behind Aaron and wait until lap four -- lap four to go, he said, okay, try to think where you can pass him and Aaron was just coming off, too, and so fast. And by the time -- I could barely get to the box going through the turn, but three and four I was definitely a lot quicker, but a disadvantage of the d-shape where it was hard to get above the person. So I had would to be beside him into three. It was just a very difficult call. But I had Tom behind me, pushing me, trying to pass Aaron, but it just wasn't enough.