LONG BEACH GP NOTEBOOK: RACE IS VASSER'S 1ST LOVE.Byline: Bob Keisser Staff Writer Jimmy Vasser Jimmy Vasser (born November 20 1965 in Canoga Park, California ) is an American racing driver. Vasser was the 1996 Champ Car champion, driving for Chip Ganassi, and has scored ten victories in the category. admits he will feel a bit sentimental when he takes the Toyota Grand Prix Grand Prix n. pl. Grand Prix Any of several competitive international road races for sports cars of specific engine size over an exacting, usually risky course. of Long Beach track today. He's a California guy, Canoga Park-born, who graduated from the Jim Russell Driving School and spent three years driving in the Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, Car Assn., before moving on to bigger cars. He made his Champ Car “CART” redirects here. For other uses, see CART (disambiguation). Champ Car, an abbreviation of "Championship Car", has been the name for a class and specification of cars used in American Championship Car Racing for many decades. debut in 1992 and his best finish that season was in Long Beach (seventh), leading up to his first start in the Indy 500. His win at Long Beach in 1996 was the springboard to his CART season title. His last win came at the California Speedway The California Speedway is a two-mile, low-banked, D-shaped oval superspeedway in Fontana, California, similar to that of "sister track" Michigan International Speedway. It is located approximately 40 miles east of Los Angeles on the site of the former Kaiser Steel mill. in 2002 and the last pole he won until last season was here at Long Beach the same year. So there's a lot of history involved when he wheels his Gulfstream/Bell Micro No. 12 PKV Racing ride onto the track Sunday in what likely is his last race here. The 40-year-old has agreed to run a handful of racing this year for PKV PKV Private Kranken Versicherung (German: private health insurance) PKV Public Key Verification as a bridge to his expanding ownership role on the team that includes Champ Car owner Kevin Kalkhoven. "Having the ability to run this race, if it is my last, is pretty fitting," Vasser, who will start 12th today, said. "I'm a California guy, I've won on this track and it's one of the greatest races in the world. So it has a lot of meaning to me. "You never want to give up the wheel. I have an opportunity to do a few races and slowly wean wean (wen) to discontinue breast feeding and substitute other feeding habits. wean v. 1. To deprive permanently of breast milk and begin to nourish with other food. 2. myself off rather than go cold turkey. I don't want to say no for next year, because you never know when a sponsor might come up." Vasser was 13th after Friday's qualifying, losing some ground when his car ran off into the tires on turn eight. "I made a mistake on the out lap," he said. "I was trying to push the car too hard on cold tires. The car just locked. It really happened in slow motion." He improved to a 1:08.641 best lap Saturday and will start alongside Rocketsports rookie Antonio Pizzonia, two rows behind PKV teammate Oriol Servia and three rows ahead of rookie PKV teammate Katherine Legge. |
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