1999 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach

1999 Long Beach

Race details
Race 3 of 20 in the 1999 CART season
Long Beach track layout
Date	April 18, 1999
Official name	1999 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach
Location	Streets of Long Beach Long Beach, California, United States
Course	Temporary street circuit 1.824 mi / 2.935 km
Distance	85 laps 155.04 mi / 249.51 km
Weather	Dry
Pole position
Driver	Tony Kanaan (Forsythe Racing)
Time	1:01.109
Fastest lap
Driver	Juan Pablo Montoya (Chip Ganassi Racing)
Time	1:02.779 (on lap 63 of 85)
Podium
First	Juan Pablo Montoya (Chip Ganassi Racing)
Second	Dario Franchitti (Team KOOL Green)
Third	Bryan Herta (Team Rahal)

The 1999 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach was the third round of the 1999 CART FedEx Champ Car World Series season, held on April 18, 1999, on the streets of Long Beach, California.

This marks the first Long Beach Grand Prix without former Long Beach winners Bobby Rahal and Al Unser Jr. Rahal retired at the end of 1998, and Al Unser was injured in the inaugural race of the season.

Report

Race

In qualifying, Tony Kanaan, the Rookie of the Year in 1998, took his first CART career pole after a close battle with Dario Franchitti. At the start, it was Bryan Herta who took the lead after passing both Kanaan and Franchitti at the first corner, but that did not last long, as both Kanaan and Franchitti passed Herta on the second lap. The duo pulled away and built a gap, whereas Herta was passed later in the stint by Juan Pablo Montoya. Montoya was running very quickly, and passed Franchitti at a restart later on and put pressure on Kanaan. As the laps went by, it was clear that Montoya was faster, and that Kanaan was under increasing pressure. On lap 46, the pressure told, as Kanaan made a mistake and crashed at Turn 6. Montoya took the lead and dominated the rest of the race to take his first career win ahead of Franchitti and Herta.

Classification

Race

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	4	Juan Pablo Montoya	Chip Ganassi Racing	85	1:45:48.688	5	20
2	27	Dario Franchitti	Team Green	85	+2.805	2	16
3	8	Bryan Herta	Team Rahal	85	+7.003	3	14
4	40	Adrián Fernández	Patrick Racing	85	+8.610	6	12
5	11	Christian Fittipaldi	Newman-Haas Racing	85	+8.831	11	10
6	5	Gil de Ferran	Walker Racing	85	+13.566	7	8
7	6	Michael Andretti	Newman-Haas Racing	85	+15.594	13	6
8	99	Greg Moore	Forsythe Racing	85	+17.399	8	5
9	7	Max Papis	Team Rahal	85	+17.718	4	4
10	12	Jimmy Vasser	Chip Ganassi Racing	85	+22.128	9	3
11	10	Richie Hearn	Della Penna Motorsports	85	+23.621	24	2
12	20	P. J. Jones	Patrick Racing	84	+1 Lap	15	1
13	18	Mark Blundell	PacWest Racing	84	+1 Lap	12
14	17	Maurício Gugelmin	PacWest Racing	84	+1 Lap	14
15	24	Scott Pruett	Arciero-Wells Racing	84	+1 Lap	20
16	22	Robby Gordon	Team Gordon	84	+1 Lap	21
17	33	Patrick Carpentier	Forsythe Racing	84	+1 Lap	17
18	19	Michel Jourdain Jr.	Payton/Coyne Racing	82	Fuel	23
19	9	Hélio Castro-Neves	Hogan Racing	76	+9 Laps	18
20	25	Cristiano da Matta	Arciero-Wells Racing	75	Contact	16
21	26	Paul Tracy	Team Green	48	Suspension	10
22	44	Tony Kanaan	Forsythe Racing	45	Contact	1	1+1
23	36	Alex Barron	All American Racing	34	Brakes	22
24	71	Luiz Garcia Jr.	Payton/Coyne Racing	28	Off course	27
25	2	Tarso Marques	Team Penske	24	Contact	19
26	16	Shigeaki Hattori	Bettenhausen Racing	21	Contact	16
27	34	Gualter Salles	Payton/Coyne Racing	17	Wing	25

Caution flags

Laps	Cause
24–26	Hattori (16) contact
28–31	Castro-Neves (9), Pruett (24), Marques (2) contact
47–52	Kanaan (44) contact
56–57	Jones (20) spin
78–81	da Matta (25) contact

Lap leaders

Laps Leader 1 Bryan Herta 2–45 Tony Kanaan 46–85 Juan Pablo Montoya

Driver Laps led Tony Kanaan 44 Juan Pablo Montoya 40 Bryan Herta 1

Point standings after race

Pos	Driver	Points
1	Greg Moore	39
2	Adrián Fernández	33
3	Gil de Ferran	33
4	Michael Andretti	32
5	Dario Franchitti	30