1999 ITT Automotive Detroit Grand Prix

The 1999 ITT Automotive Detroit Grand Prix was the thirteenth round of the 1999 CART FedEx Champ Car World Series season, held on August 8, 1999 on The Raceway on Belle Isle in Detroit, Michigan.

Report

Race

Championship leader Juan Pablo Montoya took his fifth pole of the season, and he dominated the early stages of the race, rapidly building a 6-second lead. Paul Tracy ran second early on, although it did not last for long as his teammate Dario Franchitti passed him. Franchitti was able to pull away from Tracy, but had no answer for Montoya, whose lead was up to 10 seconds before a caution caused by a coming together between Robby Gordon and Jan Magnussen triggered the first round of pitstops, during with the top 3 remained unchanged. Montoya continued to dominate once the green flag was brought out, although a miscommunication meant that he did not enter the pits when another caution period caused by Memo Gidley's car failing. The other drivers were all able to make their second stops, and effectively gained a free pitstop on him. Montoya stayed out in an attempt to get as big a lead as possible once the track went green. He built a lead of 15 seconds before he made his pistop, but rejoined only eighth, as Franchitti was handed the lead. Franchitti, despite more caution periods went on to win the race ahead of teammate Tracy in another Team Green 1-2, with Greg Moore taking the final spot on the podium. The win handed Franchitti the championship lead as well, as Montoya was taken out of the race by Hélio Castro-Neves after the latter misjudged a restart attempt.

Classification

Race

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	27	Dario Franchitti	Team Green	71	2:02:24.662	4	20
2	26	Paul Tracy	Team Green	71	+0.135	2	16
3	99	Greg Moore	Forsythe Racing	71	+0.530	7	14
4	6	Michael Andretti	Newman-Haas Racing	71	+1.471	8	12
5	12	Jimmy Vasser	Chip Ganassi Racing	71	+2.594	12	10
6	44	Tony Kanaan	Forsythe Racing	71	+3.652	6	8
7	9	Hélio Castro-Neves	Hogan Racing	71	+4.802	18	6
8	24	Scott Pruett	Arciero-Wells Racing	71	+6.750	17	5
9	8	Bryan Herta	Team Rahal	71	+7.211	11	4
10	18	Mark Blundell	PacWest Racing	71	+8.230	15	3
11	36	Gualter Salles	All American Racing	71	+9.220	25	2
12	3	Gonzalo Rodríguez	Team Penske	71	+14.473	16	1
13	10	Richie Hearn	Della Penna Motorsports	71	+15.831	21
14	11	Roberto Moreno	Newman-Haas Racing	70	+1 Lap	5
15	2	Al Unser, Jr.	Team Penske	70	+1 Lap	20
16	15	Naoki Hattori	Walker Racing	70	+1 Lap	26
17	4	Juan Pablo Montoya	Chip Ganassi Racing	68	Contact	1	1+1
18	20	Jan Magnussen	Patrick Racing	68	+3 Laps	22
19	25	Cristiano da Matta	Arciero-Wells Racing	65	Contact	14
20	71	Memo Gidley	Payton/Coyne Racing	42	Transmission	24
21	19	Michel Jourdain, Jr.	Payton/Coyne Racing	41	Transmission	23
22	5	Gil de Ferran	Walker Racing	32	Contact	3
23	33	Patrick Carpentier	Forsythe Racing	27	Contact	9
24	17	Maurício Gugelmin	PacWest Racing	27	Contact	13
25	22	Robby Gordon	Team Gordon	23	Contact	19
26	7	Max Papis	Team Rahal	0	Contact	10
DNS	40	Adrián Fernández	Patrick Racing		Injury

Caution flags

Lap Leaders

Point standings after race

Pos	Driver	Points
1	Dario Franchitti	136
2	Juan Pablo Montoya	131
3	Michael Andretti	119
4	Paul Tracy	106
5	Christian Fittipaldi	101

References