TEAM PLAYER'S DRIVER CARPENTIER ENCOUNTER SOME BUMPS IN THE ROAD AT MOLSON INDY MONTREAL
Montreal, Quebec, August 23, 2002 - The homecoming for Patrick Carpentier was very warm from a fan perspective but rough from a racing standpoint on Friday as the Team Player's driver had to settle for the 9th fastest times in the first qualifying session for Sunday's Molson Indy Montreal. An impressive crowd, on hand to support Carpentier, who grew up in Montreal suburbs not far from Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve, packed the grandstands for the Fed Ex CART Championship's first-ever event in Montreal. They witnessed a provisional qualifying session that was topped by Brazil's Cristiano da Matta, the series' leader in the point standings, who toured the 2.71-mile road course in 1 minute, 19.465 seconds (122.726 mph/197.508 km/h). New Zealand's Scott Dixon and Sweden's Kenny Bräck were three and four-tenths of a second back respectively. Carpentier put in some respectable laps early in the session on his first set of tires. When he returned to the track after getting a new set, he ran into problems with the traction control device and the pop-up valve. As a result, he was unable to improve on the time of 1 minute, 20.504 seconds that he had recorded earlier. "This wasn't the place that I wanted these things to happen," said Carpentier. "Overall, I felt that the car was quite good. In the morning practice, we were fifth and things were going well. Even this afternoon, the car was handling the track well and seemed to be well balanced, but with the problems that came up we were, unfortunately, unable to put in a good lap on it." Racing fans can follow Team Player's progress at the Grand Prix at Molson Indy Montreal throughout the weekend by logging on to the team's website at www.teamplayers.ca. They can also watch the race live on Global at 2:00 p.m. ET on Sunday.
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