IRL: Charlotte Dave's notes 97-07-22

Sam Schmidt has put together his own team in the past fifteen days. Schmidt, who owns the chassis and engines, has put his equipment into the hands of LP Racing of Indianapolis. LP Racing is owned and operated by Larry Nash who got his start in Indy car racing with Gary Bettenhausen in 1983. Schmidt's Aurora engines are prepared by NAC.

Check out Eliseo Salazar's web site at www.eliseo.com.

Team Scandia's three entries for Sospiri, Salazar and Kite all run the Aurora engine but each car has a different engine builder. Salazar's engine is prepared by Roush, Sospiri's engine by Comptech and Kite's by Lozano. Team Scandia has 21 engines and they feel comfortable using three different engine builders because they don't want to exceed one builder's capacity.

Danny "Chocolate" Myers, gasman for Dale Earnhardt's Winston Cup team will become the fuel man for the GM Brazil/Chitwood Motorsports team and rookie driver Affonso Giaffone.

This is the first national championship/Indy car race in Charlotte since Babe Stapp won a hundred mile race on a board track on September 19, 1927 in a Miller.

This is the first IRL race to be televised by CBS.

Tony Stewart set fastest lap at 214.814 mph before rain ended the evening's activities. Stewart joked that he would welcome rain all week. Team Menard tested at Charlotte and rolled off the transporter with a good set up.

The Legends cars race every Tuesday night in the Summer Shootout series at CMS. Their race was rained out.

Brad Noffsinger, crew chief for Wally Dallenbach's number 46 Winston Cup car and two time CRA sprint car champion, strolled up and down pit lane offering advice to IRL drivers on the fast way around CMS. When asked what he was doing at the track he replied, "Looking for a ride!"

David Reininger - Motorsport News International