Preview: Molson Indy Vancouver.

A muddled European swing took some of the glitter off of the monstrous start to the Champ Car World Series for Paul Tracy, and his large series lead evaporated under the lights of the Milwaukee Mile, but, undaunted, the Canadian simply pulled his belts a litter tighter and went back to work.

Four consecutive podiums, including a wildly-popular victory at the Molson Indy Toronto, has allowed the Player's Forsythe driver to reclaim his lofty perch atop the standings, turning up the heat in the search for his first career CART Champ Car title and crafting a 15-point lead heading into this weekend's 100-lap battle on the streets of Vancouver's Concord Pacific Place.

The brainchild of former CART Champ Car president and CEO John Frasco, the Molson Indy Vancouver was established in 1989 with the collective assistance from the City of Vancouver, Concord Pacific Place, Molson Breweries, BC Pavilion Corporation and Tourism Vancouver. The original course was built around BC Place Stadium, on the former Expo '86 lands on the north side of False Creek in downtown Vancouver, and the first CART race held on Labor Day weekend in 1990.

Molson Breweries purchased the race from Frasco in 1995, and has executed the event every year since under the management of their sports and entertainment division. Over the years, the continued development of the False Creek lands on the Concord Pacific Place site has resulted in numerous changes to the race track and event site and, in 1997, the organisers announced that a major change to the route would take place prior to the 1998 event.

Residential development of the False Creek area had boomed and the land required for grandstands and event amenities had become a sea of high-end condominiums and a beautiful waterfront community. From 1998 through to 2004, the track has and will run around the end of False Creek, utilising portions of downtown streets including Pacific Boulevard, Abbott Street, Expo Boulevard, Quebec Street and the Science World parking lot in Creekside Park, but could be set to change once more after next year's event.

The Molson Indy Vancouver is also no stranger to a Paul Tracy victory, as the series leader became the first Canadian driver to ever win the event when he took the chequered flag in 2000, but the Vancouver layout was not one that Tracy took to immediately, as he scored just one points-paying finish in his first six trips to BC. Since then, however, he has captured two poles and two podium finishes in the last three events.

Tracy's resurgence has dropped Bruno Junqueira off the lead, despite the fact that the Brazilian has not finished lower than fourth in each of the last four races. In fact, his opening-lap crash at Milwaukee resulted in his only finish outside of the top five through the first ten races of the season, but Tracy's season of highs and lows has been such that Junqueira is still 15 markers adrift.

Michel Jourdain Jr got back on pace in Toronto, after a pair of early-race spins had cost him chances at victory in Portland and Cleveland. The Mexican started third and came home second to earn his fifth podium of the season in Toronto, and heads to a Vancouver layout he has found to his liking in the last few seasons. Jourdain earned his first-ever CART Champ Car top-ten finish with a tenth-place run there in 1998 and, while he has never qualified any better than 15th there in seven starts, he has placed fourth and sixth respectively in the last two seasons. He will need another comparable finish to stay within reach of the rampaging Tracy, who paces the Gigante Team Rahal car by 26 points.

Coming off of his best showing in over three months, Roberto Moreno will have special motivation heading into Vancouver, as he returns to the site of his 2001 win. The Brazilian came from seventh on the starting grid to take his second career victory in the 2001 event, and comes off a Toronto race two weeks ago that saw him run his best qualifying effort of the 2003 season and earn a sixth-place finish.

Spaniard Oriol Servia is another driver that is posting career-best numbers, albeit still 63 points in arrears to Tracy. In any of the last four seasons, Servia's 76 points and his string of seven consecutive top-six finishes would have him in the top three of the standings but, as it stands now, the 29-year old Patrick Racing driver is only good for sixth overall. Nevertheless, he has tied a team record, set by Gordon Johncock, with his string of top sixes and will be looking to make it eight in a row on a track where he came from 22nd on the grid to place fifth in 2001.

The expected large crowds may be following Tracy's every move, but will also have eyes for his Player's stable-mates Patrick Carpentier and Alex Tagliani. Both have had moments of glory in Vancouver, but are yet to taste victory champagne. Tagliani earned one of his four career poles in Vancouver in 2001, and led the first 68 laps of the day before a transmission failure killed any chance of his first win. Carpentier started in the front row alongside Tagliani on that day, but finished 16th. He knows the way to the podium in Vancouver however, having climbed from eleventh place to run second to Juan Montoya in 1999.

Jimmy Vasser has a pair of Vancouver podiums on his racing resume, running third there in '99 and finishing second to Mauricio Gugelmin in '97. The 1996 series champion has qualified in the top ten in his last five CART Champ Car starts, and has been running at the end of all but one, but has gone scoreless in each of the last two races. His Team Johansson team-mate Ryan Hunter-Reay, by contrast, has scored in his last two starts, but has not raced in Vancouver since placing third there during a Barber Dodge Pro Series event in 2001.

The top-scoring Reynard runner this year is the series' second-place rookie, Darren Manning, who has put a trio of top-ten finishes together in the last three events and finds himself tenth in the standings with 50 points. He continues to chase Junqueira's Newman-Haas team-mate Sebastien Bourdais in the rookie standings, but the Frenchman keeps on rolling after his Cleveland win. The reigning F3000 champion currently leads the first-year driver standings with 86 points, a total that has him in fifth place in the overall table.

Another of the quintet of 2003 winners heads to Vancouver looking to erase past history and make his move in the title chase. Owner-driver Adrian Fernandez has scored just six points since his Portland win, and pulls into Vancouver having never qualified higher than tenth on the tight street course. He has had better success on race day however, placing third in 2000 after starting 15th, but has also suffered for his art, breaking his pelvis in a big 2002 shunt there.

Fellow countryman Mario Dominguez earned a top-ten in his one and only Vancouver run last season, and will be looking to return to form after a twelfth-place finish in Toronto. The Herdez Competition driver is having a strong sophomore season in Champ Cars, and is currently just seven points behind Fernandez and in eighth in the overall point standings.

Portuguese rookie Tiago Monteiro showed no ill-effects from the mild concussion that kept him out of the Cleveland event as he captured his fourth top-ten placing of the year with a tenth-place run in Toronto. The Fittipaldi-Dingman pilot is fourth in the rookie-of-the-year chase and has failed to finish only two of his nine starts.

The ever-changing Dale Coyne Racing line-up will have Gualter Salles back in the saddle for Vancouver, after the Brazilian missed Toronto due to a prior racing commitment in his homeland. Salles is still searching for his first point of the year - as is his team-mate Geoff Boss - but can draw on the experience of a previous Vancouver start, as he competed in the 1997 race, where he would finish 26th.

One year ago, Dario Franchitti erased the memory of past Vancouver races to hold off team-mate Paul Tracy for the win. The Scot led just 19 of the 100 laps but resisted Tracy on a restart with five to go, gaining some sweet redemption after being in a similar situation with Tracy in his mirrors at the end of the 2000 race and seeing his team-mate steal the victory. This time, the stable-mates would share the podium in Vancouver, capping an emotional day that saw Franchitti win in the hometown of the late Greg Moore, who was one of his closest friends prior to his untimely death.

Champion-elect Cristiano da Matta sat on the pole for the race, and led the first 35 laps, but suffered driveshaft problems that ended his day. Tracy would lead the most laps on the day with 45, but gave the lead back to his team-mate on his last pit-stop. Franchitti and Tracy were joined on the podium by Tony Kanaan, while Michel Jourdain Jr, and Patrick Carpentier would round out the top five.