A Regatta Today in Long Beach

For 23 years, April showers never fell on Chris Pook’s racing parade.

“Pook weather,” drivers and fans used to call it when storms mysteriously disappeared as the start of the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach drew closer. It seemed almost mystical.

Last week, Pook sold his Grand Prix Assn. of Long Beach to Dover Downs Entertainment, a race track organization in Delaware.

“Pook weather” must have been part of the sale. For the first time since the opening race in 1975, rain fell Saturday, hard at times, soft most of the time.

It was wet enough to dramatically slow the pace of CART’s premier cars and drivers, leaving the Team Rahal tandem of Bryan Herta and team owner Bobby Rahal on the front row in Ford Cosworth-powered Reynards for today’s third round of the FedEx championship car series.

Although a second qualifying session took place Saturday, no car improved on its Friday speed. The fastest lap in the wet conditions, 92.965 mph by Christian Fittipaldi, was 12 mph slower than the 29th and slowest qualifying speed Friday, 104.955 by Hiro Matsushita.

Herta’s pole-winning 111.226 mph earned him a $20,000 bonus and a shot at an additional $150,000 if he can win today’s 105-lap, 167-mile race around Long Beach’s eight turn, 1.59-mile temporary road circuit.

“Now we know why Pook sold the Grand Prix,” said Pete Biro, one of the race’s original group of organizers. “He got a long-range weather forecast and decided it was time to sell.”

Today’s race, scheduled to start at 1 p.m., will go on, rain or shine. Only if the streets get too puddled will CART officials stop it.

“Driving in the rain can become an exercise in discipline and patience,” said Rahal, at 45 the elder statesman of CART who has announced that this will be his final year as a race driver. “But if we have to race in the rain, it’s nice having us on the front row together.

“Team orders will be in place, and they are: Don’t take each other out. After that, we’ll see how things go. Very rarely have we had a day where it rains the entire race, so that puts a premium on knowing when and what to do as far as rain tires are concerned.”

The pole is the fourth in Herta’s four-year CART career and his third in the last eight races.

“This is the most important race of the year for me,” said Herta, who went to high school in Valencia and got his start in racing at the Adams karting track in Riverside. “It’s hard to put into words what starting up front and possibly winning this race means to me. For me, all races are important to win, but this one is special.”

When cars went down the back straightaway on Seaside Way on Saturday, the rooster tails they threw up looked more like an unlimited hydroplane race.

“Miss Budweiser would be proud of a roostertail like that,” Chip Hanauer said as cars raced across puddles, spraying the air. Hanauer, who retired a few years ago as the winningest hydroplane driver in history, is at the race as a publicist.

With the narrow street lined by walls, the spray seemed to be enclosed, making it like driving in thick fog.

“You’d better have your radar working when you get close to the hairpin turn,” said Fittipaldi, who has a reputation for driving fast in the wet. “When you can’t see the braking points, your back end had better tell you when the braking point has arrived.”

Fittipaldi, nephew of the legendary Emerson, has yet to win a CART race since joining the series in 1995. However, in the rain at Detroit two years ago, he led 64 of the 72 laps on a temporary street course on Belle Isle, only to lose on a restart six laps from the finish to teammate Michael Andretti.

“I’d feel a lot better if we were starting farther up front,” said Fittipaldi, who will be in the sixth row alongside defending PPG Cup and Long Beach champion Alex Zanardi. “It will be a tremendous advantage in the first few laps for ones close to the front.”

Herta, who was second-fastest in the rain, found his most difficult moments came on the two long straightaways, Seaside Way and Shoreline Drive.

“You’re running blind if you’re close to any cars,” he said. “It’s going to be nice being out front at the start. The toughest corners are just before the hairpin because of the different surfaces and the paint lines for the parking lot.

“You’re going from concrete to asphalt several times, and the paint makes the lines very slick.”

Rahal has been racing since 1973 but today--if it rains, as expected--will be the first time he has raced in wet conditions without glasses.

“With the rain and our new Lazik eye surgery, this will be the first time I won’t have to worry about my glasses fogging up,” he said. “Our biggest worry will be setting up the car so we’ll be ready for both wet and dry conditions.

“We have to compromise a little for both settings. In the rain, these cars can have a mind of their own. It’s tricky. Power is always a problem in the rain. Sometimes less power is better.

“One of the most important decisions tomorrow may be made as late as 10 to 20 minutes before the race. That’s when we’ll decide to go with rain tires or slicks. If the weather is unpredictable, it’ll be a little like rolling the dice.”

This will be the second time Rahal has started on the front row at Long Beach, but he would rather not be reminded of the first.

It was in 1985, and he was starting alongside pole-sitter Mario Andretti, who already had won a Formula One and an Indy car race on the course. Rahal, admittedly excited, got the jump on Andretti and had clear sailing, until he crashed before finishing the first lap.

“That was a long time ago,” Rahal said, laughing at the incident.

Grand Prix of Long Beach

* When: Today.

* Time: 1 p.m.

* TV: 4 p.m. delayed, ESPN.