Mystery surrounding PacWest seat.

With precious few seats remaining unclaimed for the 2002 CART FedEx Championship season the identity of Scott Dixon's teammate at PacWest is virtually the last piece of the silly-season jigsaw yet to be put in place. So will it be Oriol, Big Mo or No Show???

Nearly a full month into the new year and the annual CART silly-season still lingers on with much of the umming and ahhhing surrounding Scott Dixon's partner in Bruce McCaw's PacWest operation.

Veteran Mauricio Gugelmin partnered the 2001 Rookie of the Year last season but endured a difficult year both on and off the track and over the winter it became apparent over the winter that 'Big Mo' may be considering leaving the team, and the series he joined full-time in 1994.

However confirmation of this from both driver and team was not forthcoming and despite McCaw committing to the CART series for 2002 and being granted a two-car franchise in the latest CART stability rulings, under an apparently new RaceSport banner, the team has filed just one entry, for Dixon thus far for the 2002 season.

The plot thickened significantly earlier this week when Sigma Autosport announced it was going to be putting Max Papis in the car thought to be the domain of its 2001 pilot Oriol Servia. After two increasingly promising seasons on the CART tour, Servia instantly became linked with the seat alongside Dixon.

The young Spaniard tested with PacWest at Sebring last week and the team are planning to take two cars to the Homestead-Miami Speedway road course next week for Dixon and a driver 'officially' listed as To Be Confirmed.

With 'Big Mo' currently conspicuous by his absence there has also been some uncertainty over whether the team will use Lola's, Reynard's, Honda's or Toyota's for the upcoming campaign, although the same Reynard-Toyota combination that served the team in 2001 appears to have emerged victorious.

After lapping the 1.65-mile short road course at Sebring impressively last week, Servia looks to be favourite to land the ride although nothing is likely to be confirmed before the CART Sneak Preview at Laguna Seca in February. Gugelmin has yet to officially announce his retirement and the team hasn't officially announced that he will not return to them in 2002 while the change of franchise name to RaceSport adds another interesting ingredient.

There were several occasions last year when team owner Bruce McCaw appeared restless, especially when it came to Toyota, but the changes in the CART hierarchy and a new set of stability rules seems to have had the desired effect but it wouldn't be the biggest surprise in the world to see a partner coming on board in the near future as the team strive for two front-running cars for the first time since 1997.

That said the possibility of PacWest, or RaceSport, joining Team Rahal, Mo Nunn Racing and Patrick Racing in downsizing to a one car effort for 2002 cannot be completely ruled out with 2001 sponsors Powerware (Dixon) and Nextel (Gugelmin) finding themselves joining forces on one car.