SPARTA, Ky. — Jerry Carroll was pleased with Sunday's IRL crowd (47,323), which closed Kentucky Speedway's 2001 racing season. But the speedway chairman continues to think bigger.

        “I'm hoping 2002 will be our last year of racing without Winston Cup,” Carroll said. “That's the goal for 2003.”

        NASCAR's Winston Cup is by far America's most popular motorsports series. Kentucky drew an overflow crowd of 70,338 in June for NASCAR's No. 2 series, the Busch Grand National circuit.

        “Next year we'll have Busch again, and we'll have at least four racing weekends again,” Carroll said.

        NASCAR's Craftsman Trucks and the Indy Racing Northern Light Series (aka IRL) are both expected back. Carroll is trying to get next year's IRL race moved from its scheduled date of Aug. 11 at 1:30 p.m., hoping it won't conflict with Cincinnati's Tennis Masters Series or other local events. Carroll also promised “a major entertainment event” for 2002, a festival/concert type of show that he said the speedway will produce. “We want that to be an annual thing,” he said.

        DRY COUNTY: The torrential rain which hit the Tristate on Saturday night did not touch Gallatin County's Kentucky Speedway, which is about 38 miles southwest of downtown Cincinnati. “I know there will still be traffic after a race like this (IRL),” Carroll said, “but our staff is getting better each time.”

        BUMP STORY: “This weekend has been notable not for what has happened, but what has not happened,” ABC-TV announcer Bob Jenkins said at the start of Sunday's IRL broadcast.

        Jenkins was referring to the much-documented bumpy condition of the speedway track surface. IRL drivers had complained about it when practicing last week here, but Kentucky crews worked day and night to alleviate the problem. There had been fears of spinouts and multiple accidents, which did not materialize.

        “I told you we would have a safe track, and we did,” Carroll said.

        ABC-TV pit reporter Jack Arute opened his segment Sunday by demonstrating how the surface sealer, named Rhino Patch, works. In layman's terms, the bumps simply were smoothed over.

        HELLO, AMERICA: Sunday marked the first time a race ever was telecast from Kentucky Speedway via live “over the air” TV (ABC). Since the track opened in June 2000, most of its major races have been on cable outlets such as ESPN, ESPN2 and FX.

Lazier repeats win in IRL thriller
Kentucky Speedway Notebook
IRL-Belterra 300 Results
Special Kentucky Speedway coverage