Papis perfect in Portland

MAX Papis survived atrocious wet conditions to claim his second career victory in the Freightliner/G.I. Joe's 200 at Portland International Raceway.

Papis started from pole position and managed to avoid the numerous spins and accidents that claimed most of the championship frontrunners. In fact not one of the top ten drivers in the championship was amongst the top five finishers.

The win was Papis' first on a road course and gave Team Rahal its third victory of the season after Kenny Brack's efforts in Japan and Milwaukee. The Italian led for 69 laps and therefore collected maximum points for the race win, pole position and the most number of laps led.

"I'm very glad that I can finally show my emotions," a relieved Papis said.

"We've gone through a lot of disappointment in the last year and a half, and I didn't feel that I wanted to enjoy yesterday's pole position as much as I felt in my heart.""Today I am the happiest person here, and we drove a fantastic race and the team gave me a fantastic strategy. This was a very special win for me because we came back from zero to hero, now Mad Max is here."Roberto Moreno was runner-up, finishing 1.5 seconds behind Papis in his best result for the season. Christian Fittipaldi also produced his best finish for the year to grab third in his K-Mart Toyota/Lola.

Rookie Max Wilson drove an outstanding race to finish fourth after starting from 19th on the grid. The Brazilian was within six laps of standing on the podium when Fittipaldi pulled an inside-out move on the rookie going into turn one.

Despite battling understeer as the track started to dry towards the end of the race, Wilson was able to stay in front of Patrick Carpentier and Dario Franchitti, who finished fifth and sixth respectively.

The wet race was punctuated by nine yellow caution periods, which helped to shorten the 98-lap event to just 76 laps - the total number that could be completed in the two-hour time limit, which is enforced under CART rules for all road and street courses.

Kenny Brack managed to extend his lead over Helio Castroneves in the drivers' championship despite a 22nd-place qualifying performance and finishing 11th in the race. Castroneves was in the box seat to gain ground on Brack after qualifying in third position, but he lost a lap on the leaders when he went of the track on the opening lap and finished 17th.

Brack is now on 76 points, seven points clear of Castroneves, while Michael Andretti and Cristiano da Matta continue to hold down third and fourth positions respectively. Fittipaldi has burst into the top ten after his third place and is now fifth in the drivers' standings.

Franchitti and Dixon have moved up the points table, while Gil de Ferran has dropped to eighth. Paul Tracy and Jimmy Vasser continue their slide down the rankings and are now in equal ninth.

The battle for the manufacturers' championship has tightened significantly, as Toyota moved to within two points of Honda for the championship lead and Ford-Cosworth closed the gap from third with three of the top five finishers in the race.

RACE RESULTS
1 Max Papis (Ford-Cosworth) 2hr00:20.836
2 R Moreno (Toyota) +1.472
3 C Fittipaldi (Toyota) +3.612
4 M Wilson (Ford-Cosworth) +11.476
5 P Carpentier (Ford-Cosworth) +12.039
6 D Franchitti (Honda) +12.571
7 Scott Dixon (Toyota) +13.141
8 Michael Andretti (Honda) +13.840
9 Oriol Servia (Ford-Cosworth) +19.176
10 Cristiano da Matta (Toyota) +19.618DRIVERS' CHAMPIONSHIP
1 Brack (SWE) 76
2 Castroneves (BRA) 69
3 Andretti (USA) 53
4 Da Matta (BRA) 49
5 Fittipaldi (BRA) 46
6 Franchitti (SCO) 45
=7 Dixon (NZ) 44
=7 G De Ferran (BRA) 44
=9 P Tracy (CAN) 40
=9 J Vasser (USA) 40MANUFACTURERS' CHAMPIONSHIP
1 Honda 116
2 Toyota 114
3 Ford-Cosworth 100Next round: Marconi Grand Prix of Cleveland, Burke Lakefront Airport, Cleveland, USA - July 1