Franchitti considering options, opportunities for future

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Dario Franchitti says that he still has not decided what he will do now that Chip Ganassi Racing has closed the No. 40 Sprint Cup team.
 
The NASCAR rookie, who won the Indianapolis 500 and IndyCar Series crown, said Saturday he still is considering his options for the future. Ganassi has offered Franchitti the chance to continue his NASCAR career through its Nationwide Series team.
 
“I haven’t come to a decision,” Franchitti said in a phone interview. “I’m going to sit with [team owner] Chip [Ganassi] next week and we’re going to talk about the future and what the options are really.
 
“I’ve got to know my options before I can make a decision. Obviously I would love to get back to running in the Sprint Cup with the 40 car and [crew chief] Steve Lane.”
 
Although the team had top-35 owner points from 2007 to get in the first five races, Franchitti and his team didn’t stay in that locked-in group. The team was 40th in points when it was closed.
 
Despite the struggles and the lack of a full-time sponsor, Franchitti said he was surprised Ganassi and co-owner Felix Sabates made the move to shut down the team.
 
“I knew that there wasn’t a full-time sponsor, but I was certainly surprised because I was led to believe that even without the full-time sponsor, we would complete the year,” Franchitti said. “So that was a bit of a shock. But I understand Chip and Felix’s position because if the money is not there, the money is not there.
 
“I understand that from that point of view. The timing is never good, but it was very frustrating because I really felt we were getting on top of things, finding our way.”
 
Franchitti said his phone has been ringing from owners of various disciplines of racing. He said he will consider all options and series. As far as his NASCAR experience, it has been a roller coaster. Just a week after failing to make the race at Infineon Raceway, he qualified fourth the event last week at New Hampshire but ended up getting involved in an accident and finished 38th.
 
Stressing that he didn’t feel the results did not show how well the team was progressing, Franchitti said he feels like he has gained a lot of knowledge in just 10 career Cup races and 14 Nationwide races.
 
“I still have got a lot to learn,” Franchitti said. “I make mistakes, but I think I have got a lot less to learn than six months ago.”
 
Driving a stock car without telemetry to add to his information during a race weekend “takes me back 20 years” and it put a premium on experience, Franchitti said. Learning how the cars change during the long races was something he was just getting a grasp on.
 
“There were definitely some very difficult days, and there was also days when we really felt we were making progress and those days were fun,” Franchitti said. “I’d love to start again with the level of experience I have. I think that would have helped us a lot. It would be nice to start with the team at the level they are at now rather than the level we were at in January.
 
“I’d like that opportunity to continue and really show what we can do because at this point, I’ve got the feeling that [what] could go wrong did go wrong. … As a team, we couldn’t buy a break. It was very frustrating.”
 
The frustrations mounted when Franchitti broke his ankle in a Nationwide Series crash at Talladega Superspeedway in April. He missed five Cup races because of the injury.
 
“The injury didn’t really help things,” Franchitti said. “I suppose from a purely selfish point of view, that the only decent thing about that is they put Ken Schrader, Sterling Marlin and Jeremy Mayfield in the car – guys who have won races – and they didn’t run any better than I did.
 
“I think that helped me a little bit. I will have to say, though, that Mayfield in particular was really, really helpful in moving the team forward.”
 
Franchitti said he felt like he held his own among the rookies and was running as well as his teammates at times. Juan Pablo Montoya leads the group with his 20th position in the Cup drivers points and Reed Sorenson is 31st.
 
“The performance of the team relative to other rookies and relative to my teammates has been very, very strong,” Franchitti said. “The results haven’t shown it for many, many different reasons including blown engines, getting wrecked and all kinds of things like that.
 
“I was looking forward to going back to all the tracks for a second time.”
 
While things haven’t gone the way he has wanted and he has an unknown future, Franchitti also said it is important to know that the closing of the team didn’t affect just him.
 
“This is about a lot more people than just me,” Franchitti said. “Seventy people lost their jobs last week. There’s a whole bigger picture than that. I think that’s something that definitely has given me some perspective on the whole thing.
 
“It wasn’t just people from the 40 car. It was people from the front office, all different departments of the team. I feel bad for everybody there.”

• Mentioned Drivers:
• Dario Franchitti