CHAMPCAR/CART: Gold Coast Team Kool Green Friday Qualifying Report

FRANCHITTI SECOND AND TRACY SEVENTH IN QUALIFYING

SURFERS PARADISE, Australia, (Oct. 16, 1998) - Team KOOL Green's Dario Franchitti was second and Paul Tracy seventh in provisional qualifying for this weekend's Honda Indy in Australia. Alex Zanardi holds the pole position heading into tomorrow's final qualifying, completing the 2.795-mile street circuit in 1:32.310 at an average speed of 109.002 mph.

Zanardi was only 0.314 seconds faster than Franchitti's fast lap, who clocked a time of 1:32.781 (108.448 mph). Gil de Ferran turned in the third-fastest lap with a time of 1:32.851 (108.367 mph) followed by Bryan Herta, Michael Andretti and Scott Pruett. Tracy used his backup car in qualifying after an accident in the morning practice session. He adapted quickly and managed the seventh-best time with 1:33.330 (107.810 mph).

Tomorrow's split-session qualifying begins with the first group at 12:45 p.m. local time (10:45 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday), but Franchitti and Tracy will take to the track at 1:30 p.m. with the quickest cars from provisional qualifying.

DARIO FRANCHITTI, #27 TEAM KOOL GREEN REYNARD/HONDA/FIRESTONE: (2nd with a lap-time of 1:32.781 / 108.448 mph)

"There's a lot more left in the KOOL car and I'm still getting up to my limit. We improved the car a lot this afternoon and we're looking quite good to get the pole tomorrow. We've now got a consistent setup, so I can hustle the car a lot more. Everything we looked to improve on from this morning to this afternoon we did, so I'm happy. Now we just need to go one step further and get the pole tomorrow and I'll be happier."

PAUL TRACY, #26 TEAM KOOL GREEN REYNARD/HONDA/FIRESTONE: (7th with a lap-time of 1:33.330 / 107.810 mph)

"I'm pretty happy in general with the car that Team KOOL Green has given me today. We just need to work on putting the power down and we'll try some new things for tomorrow like gear ratios. The key here is getting off the corners well and you can't do that when you've got wheel spin. But the handling is pretty good and we'll work on it again tomorrow."

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