source: cart.com I started attending the Molson Indy Toronto as a fan in 1988 and the race at Vancouver has been a favorite of mine since my first trip there as a working member of the CART community in 1994. Both of the Canadian races have long been among the best organized and most popular events on the calendar, so like many others in the industry, I was excited when CART added a race in Montreal to the 2002 schedule. In many ways, the Molson Indy Montreal exceeded the high standard set by the Toronto and Vancouver races--mainly thanks to the venue. The Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve has hosted the Canadian Grand Prix since 1978, and this year's CART race at the same track gave Champ Car fans their first opportunity to make a direct comparison with F1. Despite a power cut instituted for 2002 and rock-hard tires from Bridgestone, Champ Car lap times were only about six seconds a lap slower than Formula One. Dario Franchitti reckoned that a 1999-spec Champ Car with additional turbo boost and the softer tires of the era would have been neck-and-neck with a Grand Prix car. "That's pretty impressive when you consider that Formula One budgets are about 20 times bigger than what we have in Champ Cars," noted 2002 CART champion Cristiano da Matta. The Montreal fans turned out in droves, setting an attendance record for CART in Canada--no small feat. The race day crowd was announced at 64,000, but many observers believe the number was closer to 80,000 and was deliberately announced as a smaller figure in order not to offend the management of the Formula One series.
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