Thursday, September 7, 2006

CASCAR: Carpentier WILL NOT race at St-Eustache this weekend

Montréal, QC, September 7, 2006 - Due to uncontrollable circumstances, Patrick Carpentier will not take part in round 10 of the CASCAR Super Series that will be held this weekend at Autodrome Saint-Eustache, located northwest of Montreal.

The event, originally scheduled last June, was rained out and postponed until this weekend. This gave the former open-wheel star an opportunity to race in front of a home crowd.

"Unfortunately, nothing seemed to work for us this week," said Carpentier, who finished sixth last weekend at Cayuga Speedway (Ontario) after starting 19th in his first-ever stock car race.

"I am disappointed for everyone who worked real hard on this project, and I want to sincerely thank Claude Aubin, from Saint-Eustache, Richard Coughlin of CASCAR and team owner Dave Jacombs for their efforts. I'm also disappointed for the fans. We worked relentlessly to fix every problem that arose, but at the end, we finally concluded that it would simply not work out. I really enjoyed my outing in this series, and I must admit that I was pleasantly surprised by the camaraderie at Jacombs Racing and in the series in general. If another opportunity presents itself, I would like to get another chance to race in Saint-Eustache."

Carpentier, currently associated with Mecachrome International, placed on hold an invitation to race with a top notch Indy Racing League (IRL) team this weekend in Chicago in order to pursue his dream of racing stock cars."

Lately, I have been telling everyone that my future in racing lies in stock car," continued Carpentier, who will fly to Las Vegas this Saturday in order to enlist his daughter in primary school.

"I would have probably accepted the IRL team invitation, but I also had the opportunity to race again with Jacombs Racing. Between the two, I opted for the stock car event, but in the end, it simply did not work out. We tried every which way. I even delayed for a couple of days the enlistment of my daughter in school in order to try and race at Saint-Eustache."

Carpentier will join CITGO/SAMAX Racing team on September 19 for a two-day test at Daytona, Florida. This test is a prelude to next January's Daytona 24-Hour race. Carpentier drove the CITGO/SAMAX Pontiac-powered Riley with Milka Duno of Caracas, Venezuela in the August 26 R0LEX Sports Car Series race at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California.

The pair, who ran as high as third, finished in seventh place. It was the Canadian driver second outing in this series. Last January, he co-drove with Christian Fittipaldi and team owner Eddie Cheever Jr. in the 24-Hour of Daytona. The team was running in fourth place with two hours to go, when they retired with a mechanical problem.

From: Carpentier News Racing Bureau Contact / Max d'Orsonnens

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