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Thursday, June 7

Championship still in sights
By Eddie Cheever Jr.
Special to ESPN.com

We're really getting into the dog days of summer now, and the IRL champion will probably be decided in the next six races or so. For teams like ours, who haven't done that well in the first few events, it's important that we pick up the pace in Texas this weekend.

This is our first race after the Indianapolis 500, and unfortunately, the month of May was a complete disaster for Cheever Indy Racing. Two days before pole day we had a series of electrical problems that almost stopped us from qualifying. During the race, my teammate Scott Goodyear was collected in somebody else's mistake, and I had an engine break.

The Infiniti engineers have analyzed what went wrong with the engine -- we broke a valve -- and we think we've defined what the problem was. We have a short-term fix for it which will take a little bit of performance out of the engine but should add to its reliability. The new Infiniti Indy 35A definitely has power. In Atlanta, which is similar to Texas, we qualified third and were running very strongly before we had a failure. We're looking to pick up where we left off in Atlanta.

Like most of the IRL drivers, I really enjoy Texas Motor Speedway. It's definitely one of the best tracks that we race on, and the state of Texas itself is a great place to be. It's neat to come to a place that has such an extensive open-wheel history. Foyt, Rutherford, Ruby -- these are all great names that came from Texas.

Texas Motor Speedway has become a very important part of our schedule. We've been coming here a lot and the teams understand it. It's not like Atlanta where the draft is paramount. The draft is very important, but the car has to handle to handle properly because the temperatures vary quite a lot.

We're doing 220 mph at Texas, and believe me, that's plenty fast if you're running on the high banking that we have here. But the banking allows you to do a lot of passing, too. It's even possible to go three abreast here for a short while. It is a track that's very physically demanding.

	“	A lot of teams that are angry at having had a very bad Indy 500 -- ourselves included -- have come to Texas with all guns blazing trying to redeem themselves. ”
		— Cheever

One of the most incredible races that I ever participated in was here at Texas last June. I spent the whole race focusing on five inches to the left, and five inches in front because I had a car on the outside, a car out front, and a car behind me. It was a very tight race in which everybody did a great job.

We finished second at the season finale here last year in October, and we would have won the race if Scott had not dragged Billy Boat along with him on the last lap. You can't fight against two cars. One car, sure, but not two.

Actually, it would have been great to have Scott here. We're very disappointed that he can't be here. He helped us a lot at the first few races this season, and he has a great record at Texas, with two wins. He's at home recovering from the back fracture he suffered at Indy, and I know he's watching all the Texas action on television and the Internet.

A lot of teams that are angry at having had a very bad Indy 500 -- ourselves included -- have come to Texas with all guns blazing trying to redeem themselves. We've put the month of May behind us and moved on. Our focus now is on doing as well as we can in the championship.

We still believe we can win it. I think if we can win three races and finish in the top-five a few other times, Cheever Indy Racing and Infiniti have a good chance at the championship.

IRL driver Eddie Cheever Jr. owns and drives the No. 51 Cheever Indy Racing Infiniti car. He will be providing a diary to ESPN.com throughout the season.

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