Nobody complained about Paul Tracy blocking the track in the Vancouver Molson Indy on Sunday. They couldn't get close enough to the runaway winner.
.The victory -- his fifth of the season -- stretched his lead from 15 points to 20 over Bruno Junqueira in Tracy's quest for his first CART championship.
It also stamped the end to a tumultuous weekend for Tracy, sometimes considered CART's "bad boy" but also its current star.
PHOTO: AP
He said he felt "betrayed" by CART over a series of recent calls against him, including Friday when the sanctioning body stripped him of the provisional pole and the championship point that goes with it after Tracy blocked other cars during qualifying.
But Tracy did most of his talk on the track, reclaiming the pole on Saturday. Junqueira, who was awarded the provisional pole and one championship point after Tracy lost it, started next to him on the front row.
Junqueira then took the lead when the green flag came out. He stayed there for 24 laps, but had to give it up when CART ruled Junqueira had jumped the start. He was forced to let Tracy's No. 3 Player's/Forsythe Racing Lola go past.
"Bruno blatantly jumped the start," Tracy said. "I was really mad, but I stayed with him. CART did the right thing because it was very obvious what happened. After I got out front, I was much, much faster than Bruno and I was able to pull away easily."
Junqueira said he was stunned when told to let Tracy take the lead.
"I got a good start and go outside where it's clean and I pass him," the Brazilian driver said. "I'll have to look at the videotape. I was 2 seconds ahead of him and it was a big frustration. I lost concentration."
The only question after that was if Tracy could stay out of the trouble that ambushed a number of drivers on the slick, narrow circuit.
He built leads of nearly 20 seconds and wound up crossing the finish line 17.82 seconds -- nearly a third of the track -- ahead of Junqueira.
It was no problem, though, as the Canadian-born driver -- now a resident of Las Vegas but still a national hero north of the border -- came up with his fifth victory in 11 races this season. He added this one to his win two weeks ago in his hometown of Toronto. He has 24 career victories.
Junqueira finished second and might have made it a little closer had he not stalled his engine on his first of three pit stops.
Rookie Sebastien Bourdais finished third, despite being involved in two early incidents, and Michel Jourdain was fourth, the last car on the lead lap. In fact, fifth-place Darren Manning, another rookie, was two laps down.
It was not a tidy race, with a series of crashes that began even before the green flag waved.
Geoff Boss and Gualter Salles, both driving for Dale Coyne, hit the wall and were out of the race as the 19-car field headed toward the start behind the pace car.
That forced CART to run the first three laps under caution while the crashed cars were taken off the track. When the green flag did finally wave, Bourdais bumped third-place starter Roberto Moreno into the wall, Tiago Monteiro and Oriol Service banged together and Mario Dominguez slid into Monteiro -- all on the fourth lap.
Bourdais then slid into the back of Dominguez under caution the next time around, but was able to continue without serious damage to the front or his car.
Dominguez was also able to continue and eventually crashed with Patrick Carpentier on lap 61 while Carpentier was running a distant second to teammate Tracy.
Taiwan’s top women’s badminton doubles duo, Hsieh Pei-shan (謝沛珊) and Hung En-tzu (洪恩慈), achieved a straight-sets victory over Japan’s Kaho Osawa and Mayui Tanabe at the Badminton World Federation (BWF) Super 300 Macau Open on Sunday. The Taiwanese pair won the final 21-18, 21-12, marking the duo’s second title this year after their win at the BWF Super 300 Taipei Open in May. The match on Sunday was their first encounter with the Japanese duo, ranked No. 63 in the world. Hsieh and Hung, ranked No. 12, began the opening game well. Hung, who plays left-handed, performed strongly at both the net and the
Canadian teenager Victoria Mboko upset top-seeded Coco Gauff 6-1, 6-4 on Saturday night to reach the National Bank Open quarter-finals. “Your support was incredible,” Mboko told the crowd in French after a chorus of “Ole, Ole, Ole” chants echoed around the venue. “I’m really happy to win today ... It’s incredible. I’m so happy to beat such a great champion.” Gauff dropped to 2-3 since winning the French Open. She followed the major victory with opening losses in Berlin and Wimbledon, then overcame double-fault problems to win two three-set matches in Montreal. Gauff had five double-faults on Saturday after having 23 in
Jobe Bellingham on Tuesday admitted to having “anxieties” on following in brother Jude’s footsteps after joining Borussia Dortmund in the summer. Jobe Bellingham, 19, is two years younger than Jude Bellingham, who joined Real Madrid in 2023 after three years at Dortmund. A centerpiece of the England national team, Jude Bellingham has emerged as one of the best players in the world in recent seasons. The younger Jobe Bellingham joined Dortmund in June from Sunderland after their promotion to the English Premier League. He admitted he understood what the perception would be ahead of the move to Germany. “It’s something you do think about.
Before Tuesday’s 7-2 win at the Atlanta Braves, Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy suggested “most people couldn’t tell you five players on our team.” A look at the standings would indicate more Brewers players soon will be recognized by more fans. After all, it is difficult to overlook a team that not only continues to extend their lead in the National League Central, but also boasts the best record in the majors. “What we’re doing in here right now is special,” right-handed pitcher Freddy Peralta said after allowing only four hits and one run in five innings, while setting a career high with
RSS