THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 29, 1994 TAG: 9407290730
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BOB ZELLER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: GREENSBORO, N.C. LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
A day after setting the unofficial fastest lap in testing for the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Rick Mast couldn't stress strongly enough how important it was that he tested before heading there next week.
``It made a big-time difference for me,'' Rick Mast said Thursday, a day after ending pre-400 testing as the unofficial speed king at 172.248 miles per hour in his Hoosier-shod Ford Thunderbird.
``We unloaded Monday at 54.10 (seconds per lap, or 166.3 mph). By the end of the first day, we were at 53.10 (169.5 mph). By the end of the second day, we were at 52.50 (171.4 mph), and by the end of the third day we were at 52.25. And that was nothing except working on the chassis'' and learning the track, he said.
After speeding around the four-turn, 2.5-mile oval for three straight days, Mast said he learned a lot of small secrets about the track.
``The first day out, all four turns were the same,'' he said. ``But by the third day, you find out each turn has its own idiosyncrasies. Learning that really helped me a bunch.''
As for the performance of the Hoosier tires, Mast clearly was more pleased than his understated reaction.
``I think they probably made the right tire,'' Mast said. ``We're in good shape. Reservedly optimistic, I guess you could say.''
Goodyear driver Bill Elliott, in a late afternoon run Wednesday, actually may have stolen the fastest lap of the day from Mast. But Elliott's single lap of 52.19 seconds (172.4 mph) was greeted with skepticism, since the best he had run earlier was a 52.80 (170.4 mph).
Mast was able to run consistently at around 52.50 (171.4 mph), using the same Hoosier model that carried Geoff Bodine to victory at Pocono earlier this month.
Hoosier, however, is bringing a different tire to Indy. And company employees are privately telling their teams the tire will be faster but will run cooler than the Pocono tire. Some Hoosier teams blistered their tires at Pocono.
The Hoosier tire for Indy reportedly will have a softer compound, but will have a thinner tread. Ideally, softer is faster and thinner is cooler.
The edge that Hoosier apparently has over Goodyear going into the historic premiere at Indy may prompt most of the non-regular teams to bolt them on when practice and qualifying begin next Thursday.
That may help them a few tenths of a second per lap, but for most it still won't be enough to make the race, in part because they didn't test.
``I'm glad I went,'' said Ricky Rudd. He started out with laps of about 55 seconds. He had his best run - 52.85 (170.6 mph) - Wednesday afternoon.
``A lot of it is the driver just learning the race track,'' Rudd said. ``There are a lot of different peculiarities at that track - different than anywhere else we run.''
``You're going to pretty much have to unload off the truck and be able to set your fast lap,'' he said. ``That first hour of practice on Thursday will be your best shot to find something, because I don't think you're going to get much track time'' before qualifying.
``If you haven't been there testing, I'm not saying you'd write them off, but you're going to have to look pretty hard at writing them off,'' Rudd said.
``If you haven't tested, it's going to be tough,'' said Len Wood of Wood Brothers Racing, whose driver, Morgan Shepherd, was down to 53.08 (169.5 mph). ``We started off at 55 and got it down to 53.''
BIGGER PURSE: The Indianapolis Motor Speedway announced Thursday that additional awards have pushed the total posted purse of the Brickyard 400 past $3.2 million and the winner will receive almost $500,000.
The initial purse was $2.68 million, but the speedway announced additional awards of some $519,000, including a $200,000 winner's award from PPG, a $50,000 Busch pole award and $64,000 in lap prize money.
Pole day awards will total at least $100,000. Besides the $50,000 from Busch, the pole winner will receive $10,000, a luxury van from Starcraft and $5,000 from GTE. by CNB