source: dcanews.com
An emotional day at
EuroSpeedway sees the Fittipaldi-Dingman Racing wrap up the final leg of their 2
race European trip with a 13th place finish at the EuroSpeedway in Lausitz
Germany. The day started off with an inspirational 13 laps around the
circuit by Alex Zanardi who took the checkered flag from friend Jimmy Vasser to
finish his 2001 race.
The team struggled with a lack of speed all weekend, but came within one spot of
the points in Sunday's event. This was the first oval race for Rookie
driver Tiago Monteiro who definitely enjoyed the experience if not the final
result. "I had a lot of fun," he said after the race.
"This was my first experience on an oval and I really enjoyed myself.
I wanted to finish, and we finished. 13th is the worst position as it's
just out of the points. I had a big fight with
Tracy
, which made things interesting. The team was great in
the pits. After I pushed so hard, I even touched the wall at one point so
I was very lucky there, I was hoping for a better finish, maybe 9th or
10th. We were there a couple of times and were counting on another yellow
or two that we didn't get when we needed it. I think it was a good
strategy that could have worked. As a rookie, I'm very happy to have
finished the race safely. Now I've got my first oval under my belt and
learned a lot about what I want in my set up so I should do much better in
Milwaukee
."
"Tiago did a good job
today," praised team owner Emerson Fittipaldi. "We need to get
the car to go faster for him. The team had quick pit stops. We took
a risk with the extra stop thinking we could recover the lap we had lost, but in
the end it didn't work out the way we had hoped. We really just need to
get faster and hope the Reynards will go faster."
With their drivers first oval race behind them, the team heads home to
Indianapolis
tomorrow to start preparations for the first night race in
CART history at the Milwaukee Mile.