Event Preview Fact Sheet 

Event/Date:    Brickyard 400/Aug. 3, 2003
Venue:            Indianapolis Motor Speedway 

Robby Gordon’s NASCAR Winston Cup Performance History at Indianapolis Motor Speedway
                                                                                                Laps Completed/

Date                        Start                       Finish                    Total Laps                             Status                    Money

8/4/02                     4                              8                              160/160                                   Running              $167,431

8/5/01                     42                            30                            159/160                                   Running                 121,434

8/5/00                     DNQ

8/3/97                     11                            28                            159/160                                   Running                 68,910

 

TOTALS      Avg. Start: 19      Avg. Finish: 22              Laps: 478/480                                  Money: $357,775

NASCAR Winston Cup Points Position: 12^th  

NOTES:

• This Week’s Race Car (chassis No. 103) was run earlier this year in Vegas, Martinsville and Michigan,  finishing 23^rd, 21^st and 22^nd, respectively

• Gordon and the No. 31 Cingular Wireless team tested at Indianapolis Motor Speedway July 14-15
• The No. 31 Cingular Wireless team is testing at Watkins Glen Monday and Tuesday
• Gordon has five top-10 finishes in nine Indianapolis 500 starts, the most recent in May 2003 driving as part of the Indy/Charlotte Double for Andretti Green Racing
• Gordon finished 22^nd in the 2003 Indy 500 after starting from the third position
• Gordon will run a FDNY/Special Olympics special paint scheme next weekend at Watkins Glen.  Cingular Wireless will donate to both organizations $50 for each lap Gordon completes, $500 for each lap he leads and $50,000 if he wins.

• The Brickyard 400 will broadcast live on NBC and IMS Radio Network Sunday, Aug. 3 at 2 p.m. ET.  Qualifying is scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 2 at 11:05 a.m. ET.

 

ROBBY GORDON QUOTES:

“In some respects, Indianapolis is just like every track — you’ve got to get around the corners as fast as possible.  A lot of people think a good lap at Indy is about the straightaways because they’re so long but it’s really all about the corners.  The Cingular Wireless team has to work on making sure I can go to full throttle before the middle of the corner.  If we can do that, we’ll be fast on the front straightaway.  

“After our test at Indy two weeks ago, I think we can go back there and qualify on the front row.  We worked a lot on getting more grip and balance in the Cingular car. We had a good test the first day but got rained out the second day, although we were very good in the few laps we made before the rain hit.  We only got to do 30 laps and there were more things we wanted to learn about our car.  Handling is so important at Indy and the better we can get off turns four and two, the better laps we’ll run.  You can’t carry the speed initially on the straightaway no matter how much horsepower you’ve got.  The corners are the most important part of the track at Indy. It’s always been that way with the Indy cars, also. 

“Compared to other tracks, Indy has a good racing groove. It has really good grip and is a pretty flat race track. For some reason, the Cingular team has run best on flat race tracks. We run really good at Loudon, Martinsville, Richmond and places like that. Right now, those tracks seem to be suiting me best.  We were good at Indy last year and had a great test earlier this month.  We’re hoping for a pretty good weekend.  

“We definitely need to get a better starting spot for the Cingular Wireless Chevrolet than what we did in Pocono.  Passing has become hard everywhere we go nowadays, and with all the grip Indy has, the speeds are higher and it just makes passing harder, especially in a Winston Cup car.   

“I did the Double earlier this year in May with the Indy 500 and Coca-Cola 600 but I really don’t think I have an edge up on any of the other drivers because of that.  There is a big difference between an IRL car and a Winston Cup car. Everything is different, from the cars’ weight to tires to grip to downforce. The way in which the two types of cars stop and accelerate is different, also.  The most important thing is that you have to drive both cars on the ragged edge to be competitive.  There’s nothing that the two really have in common except they have four tires and an engine. 

“We can go wide-open in an Indy car during qualifying but we can’t do that in a Winston Cup car or we’ll be wide-open into the wall hard. It’s hard to keep an open-wheel car wide-open around Indy because of the turbulent air.  But we definitely hold it wide-open more in an Indy car than a Winston Cup car.

“Indy is a race track I simply love racing. I have been racing there for 10 years. It is probably one of the most popular speedways in America.  I’d say Daytona and Indy are probably neck-and-neck. If you don’t win the Daytona 500, you want to try to position yourself to win the Brickyard 400.  It’s no secret that I would give my right arm to win the Indy 500 but if I can’t win that one, I would love to win the Brickyard.  Indy is Indy and it is so steeped in tradition that it would be an honor to win either race there.”

 

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