A Different Indy 500: Brayton Grabs Pole

Someone said long ago that the longer you’re at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the harder it is to figure out.

Take what happened Sunday during qualifying for the May 28 Indianapolis 500, for instance:

--Scott Brayton, Arie Luyendyk and Scott Goodyear, drivers who don’t even have a ride on the Indy car circuit, qualified on the front row, with Brayton on the pole.

--Penske drivers Al Unser Jr., the defending 500 champion, and Emerson Fittipaldi, who between them led 193 of 200 laps in last year’s race, did not try to qualify on the first weekend. The fastest last year were too slow this year.

--Bobby Rahal, who gave up on developing the Honda engine when he couldn’t get it up to speed last year, failed to qualify on the first day with his Mercedes-Benz engine--but Goodyear used a 1995 model Honda. Rahal qualified later, in 22nd position.

--Firestone tires, which had not been at Indy for 21 years, were on seven of the 25 cars that qualified, including Goodyear’s.

Goodyear, who started the year without a ride of any kind because Kenny Bernstein’s Indy car team folded after the 1994 season, bumped Michael Andretti off the front row with four laps at 230.759 m.p.h. in Sunday’s continuation of the first-day qualifying that started late Saturday because of rain.

“We did 226 in the morning warm-up and came in and made some changes, but we didn’t get to test them,” Goodyear said. “Last-minute changes don’t always work, but this time they did. The car was close to being perfectly balanced.”

No one could match the Saturday speeds of Brayton, a 14-year Indy 500 veteran who ran 231.604 m.p.h. in his Lola-Menard; or Luyendyk, Brayton’s Menard teammate, who qualified at 231.031.

“My nerves really hit my body when I heard Goodyear’s first lap,” Brayton said. “Until that moment, I wasn’t really nervous because conditions were so different today. I didn’t think anyone could get close to me or Arie, but he gave me a scare.”

John Menard, the Wisconsin businessman who took 10-year-old Buick V6 passenger car engines and retooled them into racing Menards in his Indianapolis garage, was ecstatic to see his two cars on the front row.

“This is a dream come true,” he said. “The program started about 2 1/2 years ago, and Larry (Curry, director of racing) and (Brayton) and I spent hours scheming and testing to get where we are today. It took a full 2 1/2 years. This is our dream, our job, it’s what we do. Some guys play golf. This is what we do.”

The Menards are not eligible for any of the other 16 PPG Cup Indy car races because of their engine size. Goodyear is contracted to run only the Indy 500, although he said, “This could open something up, but we’re not thinking about it until after the 500.”

Goodyear did not become part of Steve Horne’s fledgling Tasman team until after the Indy car opening race in Miami.

“When I decided to get back in Indy car racing, Andre (Ribeiro) was my first choice because he had won four Indy Lights races for me last year,” Horne said. “Honda wanted a second driver for Indy because they didn’t want to come here with one rookie driver. After what happened last year (when Rahal’s Honda was bumped from the field), they wanted to make sure they made the race.

“Goodyear was available, so we took him on.”

Horne also credited Parker Johnstone for helping develop the new Honda engine.

Johnstone was scheduled to drive a Honda for the Comtech team, but his car was withdrawn when sponsorship money could not be raised. When Rahal gave up on the Honda engine development program after failing to win a race, Horne said he considered it “the chance of a lifetime” when Honda approached him.

“All you have to do is look at the Honda record,” he said. “For years it has been one of the world’s leading engine manufacturers in racing. It was only a matter of time before they hit the mark at Indy.”

Roger Penske has hit plenty of marks, but none so far this year. Asked what was the matter with his cars, he said, “If we knew what was wrong, we’d fix it.”

Partial Indianapolis 500 Lineup

The partial lineup for the May 28 Indianapolis 500. More qualifications on Saturday and Sunday.

ROW 1

Driver Residence Car No. Chassis-Engine 1. Scott Brayton Coldwater, No. 60 1995 Lola-Menard Mich. 2. Arie Luyendyk Netherlands No. 40 1995 Lola-Menard 3. Scott Goodyear Canada No. 24 1995 Reynard-Honda ROW 2 4. Michael Andretti Nazareth, Pa. No. 6 1995 Lola-Ford 5. Jacques Villeneuve Canada No. 27 1995 Reynard-Ford 6. Mauricio Gugelmin Brazil No. 18 1995 Reynard-Ford ROW 3 7. Robby Gordon Orange No. 5 1995 Reynard-Ford 8. Scott Pruett Granite Bay, Ca. No. 20 1995 Lola-Ford 9. Jimmy Vasser Discovery Bay, Ca. No. 12 1995 Reynard-Ford ROW 4 10. Hiro Matsushita Japan No. 25 1994 Reynard-Ford 11. Stan Fox Janesville, Wis. No. 91 1995 Reynard-Ford 12. r-Andre Ribeiro Brazil No. 31 1995 Reynard-Honda ROW 5 13. Roberto Guerrero San Juan No. 21 1994 Reynard- Capistrano Mercedes 14. Eddie Cheever Aspen, Colo. No. 14 1995 Lola-Ford 15. Teo Fabi Italy No. 33 1995 Reynard-Ford ROW 6 16. Paul Tracy Canada No. 3 1995 Lola-Ford 17. r-Alessandro Zampedri Italy No. 34 1994 Lola-Ford 18. Bryan Herta Valencia No. 4 1995 Reynard-Ford ROW 7 19. Danny Sullivan Aspen, Colo. No. 17 1995 Reynard-Ford 20. r-Gil de Ferran Brazil No. 8 1995 Reynard- Mercedes 21. Hideshi Matsuda Japan No. 54 1994 Lola-Ford ROW 8 22. Bobby Rahal Hilliard, Ohio No. 9 1995 Lola-Mercedes 23. Raul Boesel Brazil No. 11 1995 Lola-Mercedes 24. Buddy Lazier Vail, Colo. No. 60T 1995 Lola-Menard ROW 9 25. r-Eliseo Chile No. 7 1995 Lola-Ford Salazar

M.P.H 1. 231.604 2. 231.031 3. 230.759 ROW 2 4. 229.294 5. 228.397 6. 227.923 ROW 3 7. 227.531 8. 227.403 9. 227.350 ROW 4 10. 226.867 11. 226.588 12. 226.495 ROW 5 13. 226.402 14. 226.314 15. 225.911 ROW 6 16. 225.795 17. 225.753 18. 225.551 ROW 7 19. 225.496 20. 225.437 21. 227.818 ROW 8 22. 227.081 23. 226.028 24. 226.017 ROW 9 25. 225.023

r-rookie.

Field average: 227.181 m.p.h. The record for the 33-car field is 223.479 m.p.h., set in 1992.