This Time, Hakkinen Gets a Win

Failing to finish six of his previous seven starts in the Canadian Grand Prix made Sunday’s victory all the sweeter for Mika Hakkinen of Finland, the defending Formula One champion.

“I’ve been having a real hard time in Canada and I even got some negative feelings coming to Canada,” Hakkinen said. “There was always something going wrong here. Now I love Canada. It’s a fantastic place.”

His history at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve on Ile du Notre Dame shows Hakkinen’s only success here a fifth place in 1996, the one time he did finish.

“This year when I came here I decided to take a really serious concentration to do well,” he said. “I do that every year, but this is the big one, a big jump for me. This was some magic.”

Part of the formula for Hakkinen’s third victory of the season, second in a row and the 12th of his career was an uncharacteristic driving error by two-time Formula One champion Michael Schumacher of Germany.

Schumacher, who came into the race holding a six-point lead over Hakkinen in the championship race, started from the front of the 22-car field--ending Hakkinen’s string of five consecutive poles--and led the first 29 laps of the 69-lap event before crashing.

“I lost control of the car at the last chicane because I went off the racing line and got on the dirt,” Schumacher said. “This was clearly my mistake. It was a shame because the car was working perfectly.”

After six of 16 races, Schumacher fell behind the Hakkinen by four points, 34-30, in their battle for the 1999 title.

For Hakkinen, it was his third victory of the season, second straight and 12th of his career. He averaged 111.946 mph in a race that took 1 hour, 41 minutes, 35.727 seconds.

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Dale Jarrett was having the time of his life. Still, he didn’t blame fans for leaving after he turned the NASCAR Winston Cup Kmart 400 into a leisurely drive at Michigan Speedway in Brooklyn, Mich.

Jarrett took the lead from Jeff Gordon on the 53rd lap and easily held on to the lead the rest of the way.

“Sitting as a fan, I’d hate to see a race like that,” Jarrett said after his second victory of the season. “But where I was sitting, there couldn’t be anything better than having an almost perfect race car and no cautions to interrupt that.”

Jarrett went into the race leading the Winston Cup series by 51 points over Jeff Burton and by 339 points over Gordon, who has won the series three of the past four seasons.

“That’s probably the best race I’ve ever driven,” said Jarrett, whose Ford led by almost 15 car-lengths going down the final backstretch at the two-mile oval.

Jarrett, with no caution flags to slow him, set a race record of 173.997 mph, eclipsing Rusty Wallace’s mark of 166.033 set at Michigan on June 6, 1996.

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Phil Burkart won his first ever national event at the 35th annual NHRA Pontiac Excitement Nationals at Kirkersvlle, Ohio.

Burkart covered the quarter-mile in 5.163 seconds at a speed of 280.89 mph in his funny car, beating Tim Wilkerson, who ran an 8.707 at 98.79.

Doug Herbert and Warren Johnson also were winners in their respective categories.

Herbert earned his second top fuel victory of the year by running a 4.696 at 313.00, enough to get past Bob Vandergriff’s run of 4.763 at 282.84. Johnson earned his fifth pro stock victory of the year. He ran a 7.008 at 197.57 to beat hometown favorite Jeg Coughlin, who ran 7.061 at 197.97.

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BMW, racing for only the second time under its name, won the Le Mans 24 Hour race after a close finish with Toyota.

Pierluigi Martini of Italy held off a late challenge to give BMW its first victory in the famed endurance race. Martini, Yannick Dalmas of France and Joachim Winkelhock of Germany completed 365 laps, one more than Toyota.

Dalmas won for the fourth time at Le Mans, following wins in 1992 with Peugeot, in 1994 in a Porsche and in 1995 with McLaren. Only Belgium’s Jacky Ickx (six) and Britain’s Derek Bell (five) have more wins.

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Former Formula One champion Sir Jack Brabham defeated a group of Senior Championship Racing Assn. drivers that included three Indianapolis 500 winners in the organization’s inaugural race during the Motor Trend Thunder Historic racing program. Pikes Peak hillclimb champion Roger Mears was second and Indy 500 winner Tom Sneva third. All drove Dodge Neons over a 1.7 mile road course at the Marine Air Station in Tustin.