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As I wanted to have a pictured autographed by Max, the first pit I visited today - still early in the morning, a little past 8h00 - was Sigma.
I immediately noticed that the car had no Sunoco stickers, and I approached a mechanic to discuss the subject. His name was Antonio, responsible for the gearbox - a very nice Italian fellow (we spoke for at least 30 minutes! Put two Italians together and you've got a conference...)
He said that the Sunoco deal was a one-race deal, and that everybody in the team was disappointed. He sounded very downbeat, and only hours later - with the car not making the track - is that I would realize why. Antonio continued, complaining that the chassis was last year's, and that he was saving all parts he could, re-using as much items as possible. The other mechanics were around, but nobody was working on the car, which was fairly assembled (as much as the others for that time in the morning).
I saw Max at the other end of the garage (back), so I ran around and got to talk to him. He was the charming guy as always, but I noticed that he was holding his girlfriend very tightly, even when talking to me and to a Canadian fan who had driven throughout the night from Vancouver to watch the race. Likely Max was fully aware of the bad news, and was searching from comfort on loved arms...
The practice session begun and I went to the end of the pitlane. I saw all cars pass by, bar Sigma's... "This is unusual", I thought. But things went on, and the track announcers tried to cool down things, saying that Sigma - which they called "the Cinderella of the paddock" (lovely analogy, if not sad though, as there are no crystal shoes to be wore on CART) had a different strategy than the other teams. According to the announcers, Sigma was "saving parts" as they had one chassis only, and the story of Max shunt in Laguna Seca on the warm up was recalled (Antonio had mentioned the same case, and pointed to the fact that the team ran out of some parts after the completion of the repairs).
When the practice session ended, Max was interviewed, and he abruptly said that "you (the reporters) should not talk to me, you should talk to the team owner and ask why the car is not running"). Then reality sunk on me - it was another team folding an entry.
It was a great day in Portland, and I had lots of fun - but at the back of mind I kept on thinking on the Sigma team. Things in the CART paddock may be worse then what most of us had conceived.
At the autograph session I was talking to a number of fans and race officials while we waited for the drivers to arrive. I congratulated an official, as I saw the provisional dates of the 2003 CART race published at the Control Tower wall - I said that it would be cool to such a nice place as Portland to keep a slot in the calendar. He smiled and replied "yes, but assuming there will be a calendar next year".
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