Track Gets Rave Review

The reviews were rave ones as the NASCAR Winston Cup Series christened the California Speedway, Roger Penske’s sparkling new track in Fontana, Calif.

Thursday served as an open test day for teams preparing for today’s qualifying and Sunday’s California 500.

“It’s impressive,” said defending NASCAR Winston Cup champion Terry Labonte, who by the late afternoon session had turned in some of the fastest speeds of the day, turning a lap of 181.497 mph (39.670 seconds). “If you look back, everything Roger Penske does is first class. It looks like to me he might put some pressure on these other tracks.”

Two weeks after Paul Tracy’s racing career literally turned upside down, he’s back behind the wheel looking to widen his lead in the CART Indy-car point standings.

A mysterious case of vertigo kept Tracy out of the Detroit Grand Prix and he could only watch as his 24-point lead in the standings shrank to eight over Michael Andretti and nine over race winner Greg Moore.

Tracy will be back in his Team Penske car for today’s first day of qualifying for Sunday’s Budweiser-G.I. Joe’s 200 in Portland.