Michael Andretti wins Motorola 300

• ANDRETTI'S WIN IS THE 38^TH OF HIS CHAMP CAR CAREER
• ANDRETTI'S WIN IS FORD'S 200^TH PAVED OVAL WIN
• ANDRETTI'S WIN COMES 30 YEARS TO THE DAY OF HIS FATHER MARIO'S WIN AT THE INDIANAPOLIS 500
• ANDRETTI'S WIN MARKS THE 20^TH WIN ON MEMORIAL DAY FOR FORD
• ANDRETTI HAS LED 290 OF THE 708 LAPS CONTESTED AT GATEWAY OVER THE LAST THREE YEARS.

Michael Andretti-6-K Mart/Texaco/Havoline Ford-Cosworth – Finished 1^st - "Helio was really coming on. But, I have to give credit to Firestone. We decided to try to get track position and not take on tires after our last stop so we went out and did a very quick stop. We took a gamble because we didn't know if the tires were going to make it the rest of the way. The tires were just incredible. They just kept going, going and going. They have a lot to do with this win. Also, the entire K-Mart/Texaco team called a perfect race. I questioned our decision to some on our second to last stop. I think me and Dario (Franchitti) came in together and I thought to myself that we gave away a lot of good track position but they kept telling me that this will help us in the end and it did. It allowed us to beat the other guys out of the pits on the last stop and it turned out to be perfect strategy. The Ford engine ran perfect and the Swift chassis ran perfect. I knew we were going to have our hands full at the end because Helio was coming on and he had fresher tires. Normally the tries have about 20 laps on them that they are really good and then they go out a bit and hold. I know I had to hold off his challenge for a while and was pretty confident that if I did that then I should be able to hold him off the rest of the race. There were a couple of times that he got pretty close but he never got close enough. He did a good job and I knew what had to be done and I was just praying at the end that the tires would hold up and we were actually running some pretty quick times. At the end, especially during the last couple of laps (Scott) Pruett and Al (Unser) were complete gentlemen getting out of the way and that showed they are true professionals there. They didn't mess up the show. They were very good to all three of us. Unfortunately they were a bit too good to the other two. We had a good fight there at the end."