Monday, October 18, 1999

CART points title comes
down to final race

Associated Press

Dario Franchitti's victory in the Gold Coast Indy and a botched braking maneuver by Colombian rookie Juan Montoya ensured that the CART FedEx points championship will go down to the final race.

Franchitti, the pole winner who trailed Montoya by 12 points going into Saturday's race, led for 49 of 65 laps and finished the tricky, 12-turn, 2.795-mile Surfers Paradise temporary street course race in 1 hour, 58 minutes, 40.726 seconds.

With the win and his 22 points for the weekend -- 20 for the victory and a point each for winning pole and leading the most number of laps in the race, Franchitti has 209 points this season.

Montoya, bidding to become the first rookie since veteran Nigel Mansell won the series title in his first year of CART racing in 1993, has 200 points.

Franchitti, who has six career wins, will take his nine-point lead into the final race of the season, the Marlboro 500, at Fontana, Calif., on Oct. 31.

The top 12 drivers at season's end will receive automatic slots in the Nov. 13 Hawaiian Super Prix at Kalaeloa Airport. The top 15:

1. Dario Franchitti -- 209
2. Juan Montoya -- 200
3. Paul Tracy -- 161
4. Michael Andretti -- 151
5. Max Papis -- 133
6. Adrian Fernandez -- 120
6. Christian Fittipaldi -- 107
8. Gil de Ferran -- 104
9. Greg Moore -- 97
10. Jimmy Vasser -- 94
11. Bryan Herta -- 84
12. Tony Kanaan -- 80
13. Patrick Carpentier -- 61
14. Roberto Moreno -- 58
15. Helio Castro-Neves -- 48

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Hawaiian Super Prix