CART Brack claims first win of year

His brief final pit stop enabled him to slip past Dario Franchitti to win the season final.
MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Kenny Brack took a long pit stop early and it paid off late.
Brack used a brief, final pit stop to slip past Dario Franchitti and claim his first victory of the year in the final race of the CART season.
"We took more fuel there [on the second pit stop] to be able to do a shorter stop the third one," Brack said. "That was really what decided the race."
Series champion Cristiano da Matta finished four seconds back while pole sitter Bruno Junqueira recovered from a bad start to finish third in the race before what organizers said was a CART-record crowd of 174,866. It was the first major race in a decade at the newly rebuilt Hermanos Rodriguez Autodrome.
Moves up to seventh place
The victory put Brack in seventh place in the point standings after a difficult year. Junqueira, Brack's Chip Ganassi teammate, earned $500,000 for finishing second in the CART series.
Confusion in the pits cost Tony Kanaan and Dario Franchitti the lead while Brack and da Matta used deft pit work to leap ahead.
Most drivers pitted at the 53rd lap after a crash by Michael Andretti brought out a yellow flag. Dario Franchitti had been leading, but he got caught in a tangle of cars leaving the pits as Brack slipped out ahead.
Kanaan led the first 40 laps, but he was struggling with a bad clutch and lurched away from a pit stop before the fuel nozzle was completely disengaged. Flames broke out and four crew members suffered burns and flame inhalation, though none were hospitalized. Kanaan was penalized with a drive-through of the pit area and wound up eighth.
Da Matta, who had struggled with his car all week, credited his crew for his finish.
"I came into the pits for my last stop in eighth place and got back on track second." He nearly passed Brack on the outside, "but I just couldn't make it," he said.
Da Matta's teammate Christian Fittipaldi slipped from second to ninth on the same stop before dropping out on lap 67 with a broken exhaust.
This was the final CART race for many of the drivers and teams, and the results reflected what CART will be losing.
The top three finishers Sunday all drove cars powered by Toyota, which is abandoning the CART series next year, as is Honda. Ford-Cosworth will be the lone remaining engine maker. Two of the top three finishers belong to the Ganassi team, which also is leaving.
Heading to IRL
Brack, who scored the first road-course win of his career, is likely headed to the IRL along with his team. Da Matta will be driving for Toyota's Formula One team and Fittipaldi is headed for NASCAR.
Junqueira is expected to remain in CART, replacing da Matta at the Newman-Haas team.
"I think the series no doubt is going through a difficult time with two engine manufacturers withdrawing," da Matta said. With a crowd of new drivers expected next year, he said he expected "a bigger difference between the big teams and the small teams."
Race organizers said more than 350,000 people turned out over the three days of qualifying and racing around the 2.786-mile road course.
The crowd had at least one thrill, though it was more show than substance. Mexico's Michael Jourdain Jr., who did not pit under the yellow flag after Andretti's accident, took the lead, causing a roar as he sped around the track until rules forced him to pit on lap 61. He finished 13th.
Team owner Bobby Rahal announced before the race that Jourdain was signed for two more years.
Trouble at the start
There was a rough start to the 73-lap race. Paul Tracy bumped into the back of Jimmy Vasser's car and veered off into a gravel trap, putting him a lap back.
"I took myself out of it on the first corner," Tracy said.
Junqueira said he bungled an attempt to pass Kanaan on the first lap, his foot slipping off the throttle, getting stuck in the wrong gear and then veering off the course. He slipped to ninth place and spent the rest of the race patiently working his way back toward the front.
Andretti lost control and crashed on lap 50 of his final race in the series.