Herta Finds Second Car to Drive at Long Beach

In the last nine months, Bryan Herta’s career in the CART champ car series has experienced more twists and turns than there are in the 1.97-mile street course he will negotiate Sunday in the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach.

The latest turn of events for Herta occurred Monday, when the 29-year-old from Valencia was chosen to replace injured Shinji Nakano behind the wheel of Derrick Walker’s Reynard-Honda for the next two races, five days after it was announced that Herta’s regular employer, Gerald Forsythe, would have to find a new chassis for the current season.

The Forsythe team struggled with the setup of its Swift-Honda since Herta came on board in January. Swift terminated its relationship with Forsythe last week, apparently taking Panasonic’s sponsorship with it since the San Clemente manufacturer is owned by Panasonic heir Hiro Matsushita.

Nakano will sit out Long Beach and the April 30 race at Rio de Janeiro after suffering several small bruises to his brain in a crash during a test session at the Milwaukee Mile on March 31.

Swift has entered Brazilian rookie Tarso Marques in the Long Beach race, with Panasonic as primary sponsor.

Herta and Marques participated in a test session at Phoenix two weeks ago, with Herta driving a Swift that had been set up by the Forsythe team and Marques in a Swift that had been set up by Swift engineers. Herta came away from the test thinking that the car could finally be competitive, and was caught by surprise when Swift pulled out.

“We were making progress with [the car], and we were at a point where we needed to go out and see just exactly where we were stacking up against the other guys,” Herta said. “Even though we weren’t going to go out and stick it on the pole.”

Herta said Forsythe has given assurances that the team will field an entry this year, with the most likely option being the Reynard-Honda combination that Forsythe used successfully with Brazilian Tony Kanaan in 1999.

“It just puts me that far ahead of the game when we go back racing with Forsythe,” Herta said of being loaned to the Walker team. “It will enable me to get some knowledge of the Reynard-Honda in the 2000 package. The set of circumstances is not what you’d hope for with Shinji and his injuries, but the solution is a positive for everybody.”

Herta finished third at Long Beach in 1998 and ’99 and started the 1998 race from the pole while driving a Reynard-Ford owned by Indianapolis 500 winner Bobby Rahal. There are differences between the current Reynard chassis and what Herta drove for Rahal, but Herta is adapting quickly.

“It’s very similar to last year’s model,” Herta said after driving 60 laps Tuesday in a test session at Phoenix International Raceway. “When you are talking about a half a second or a second in lap time over an entire track, the degree of change is probably smaller than what you might imagine. But it does behave differently, and the biggest thing, it feels different.

“The steering-wheel position is a little different, the shift knob is in a different spot, your seating position changes a little, so when you drive a car a lot those things all become second nature.”

Herta said the focus of Tuesday’s test sessions are to enable driver and crew to work together as a team.

“There are a lot of personality things that are the most important thing we are really working on here,” Herta said. “It’s just working together as a group and them learning a little bit about how I want the car and me learning about how they work with the car.”

Herta was unaccustomed to spending a winter season without a contract, but he looked at the time away from racing as a positive.

“I haven’t been home this much in the winter with my wife and my family in years,” Herta said. “I didn’t have any [public relations] appearances to do, I didn’t have any testing I had to go out and do, and I did get to spend some time at home.

“I actually enjoyed that part of it, so when it was time to get back in the car I was really fired up. I felt my batteries were really recharged to go do it.”

Herta said he intends to resume a regular racing schedule this season, despite the uncertainty with the Forsythe team.

“I am not willing to wait until next year,” Herta said. “I don’t want to not race all year. I don’t want to do these two races and just sit around, and I don’t really want to be in the position where [Forsythe] is loaning me out to different teams.

“I fully expect we are going to be back racing at some point this year and that is what I want.”

Don’t look for Herta to be conservative just because he is driving someone else’s car.

“I think my motivation really is to try and go out and win the race,” he said. “If I didn’t feel like that was possible, then I wouldn’t have agreed to do this.”