Even though Gil de Ferran has won championships the last two years in the CART series, he has no illusions that taking another title in his first full Indy Racing League season will be a cinch.

"You know, I keep hearing things about our team winning most of the races and being dominant, but the IRL is a very competitive series with a tremendous amount of talent on the track and off of it," the Brazilian driver said. "I'm not expecting to have anything handed to us."

	Unlike many observers, Team Penske's Gil de Ferran doesn't expect to dominate the IRL in 2002.

Still, there has been plenty of talk about dominance since Roger Penske decided to move his elite team -- the winningest in open-wheel history -- from CART to the still-fledgling IRL.

The reality will begin to come into focus Thursday when practice opens in Homestead, Fla., for the season-opening Grand Prix of Miami. It will be the first of a record 15 events for the series, starting its seventh year.

Last year, both de Ferran and teammate Helio Castroneves led laps in their IRL debuts in Phoenix before running into problems and falling back into the field. They then finished 1-2 in the IRL's crown jewel -- the Indianapolis 500 -- with Castroneves beating his countryman and leading a CART sweep of the top six spots before returning to the rival series.

It was not a pleasant day for the regulars in the IRL, which was born in 1996 and boycotted by the top CART owners and drivers until 2000.

Chip Ganassi, another longtime CART team owner, was the trailblazer for Penske and others, returning with his regular drivers to Indy that year, with Juan Montoya winning the race for him and earning bragging rights for the other series.

Now Ganassi, who also will continue to field two cars in CART and two in NASCAR's Winston Cup Series, is set to run IRL regular Jeff Ward for the full season.

"We feel like the time is right to make this move," Ganassi said. "This has nothing to do with CART. It's just a good business decision."

There is plenty of holdover talent to take on the CART invaders.

Sam Hornish Jr., the youngest open-wheel champion ever at age 22, is back with Panther Racing and ready to defend his title. Hornish took the 2001 championship with consistency and flair, winning three races -- including Homestead -- and finishing among the top six in 12 of 13 races.

"I know we had the kind of year when things just seemed to go our way, but this is such a good team that I don't see why we can't keep it going in 2002," the confident youngster said.

Buddy Lazier, a former IRL champion, was second in the points last year and, like most of the other series regulars, is taking the arrival of the Penske and Ganassi teams as a personal challenge.

"We have a lot of pride and a lot of talent in this league," Lazier said. "We know they are going to be good, but I think it's just going to make the overall competition that much better and everybody has a chance to win some races."

Last year, there were eight different winners in the 13 races, with Lazier leading the way with four. Among the returning IRL regulars with wins in 2001 are Eddie Cheever, Jaques Lazier -- Buddy's younger brother -- Scott Sharp and Al Unser Jr.

Unser, a two-time CART champion before coming to the IRL in 2000, has a new ride and a new attitude.

After the Galles Racing team lost its primary sponsor and folded last fall, Unser was left without a job for the first time in more than 20 years. Criticized by some for being of shape, he lost more than 20 pounds and is in his best physical conditions in years.

Tom Kelley saw the new dedication and decided to give the 39-year-old Little Al a chance to prove himself, teaming Unser with former series co-champion Sharp.

"It's as good a team as I've ever been with," said Unser, who had some of his greatest successes with Penske in the 1990s. "It's giving me a chance to prove myself and I'm going to take full advantage of it."

Most of the cars in the IRL field will be powered this year by engines bearing the Chevrolet nameplate. Chevy takes over the program from Oldsmobile, the General Motors brand that has dominated the series but is being phased out.

A handful of teams, most notably Cheever's two-car effort, will challenge Chevy with Nissan Infiniti engines. Cheever is responsible for both Infiniti IRL victories thus far.

"It's a big challenge," Cheever said. "They've got more teams and put a lot of resources into the series, but we're making a lot of progress. I think we can give everybody else -- everybody -- a run for it this year."