# 2002 Honda Indy 300

The 2002 Honda Indy 300 was the seventeenth round of the 2002 CART World Series season, held on 27 October 2002 on the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit, Surfers Paradise, Queensland, Australia.
The race was marred by extremely wet conditions. The initial start resulted in a multi-car crash injuring Fernandez and Takagi. CART officials allowed teams to repair their cars or pull out backups. Postponing the race was not an option due to international travel logistics, as cars had to get to Fontana, California by Tuesday US time to allow for conversion to superspeedway configuration and the 500 mile oval race scheduled the following weekend, and logistics of the street course circuit, as organizers were contractually required to have the entire course cleared by the next morning. The race restarted on lap 3 with slightly improved conditions, but went back under yellow at lap 10 where it would remain until the race was called at lap 40.
Michael Andretti's team believed the race would be called once the race passed official race status of the full lap past the halfway point (35 laps plus one) of the original distance (70 laps, but the race was shortened to 50 laps by officials after the start crash), but officials instead waited until lap 40 to force each car to make two pit stops. This gave Domínguez his first career win in the slowest race in CART history. For 2003, rules were changed to allow the race to be called prior to halfway with only half points being awarded. This rule was not implemented by IndyCar after the 2008 reunification.

## Qualifying results

| Pos | Name | Team | Chassis | Time |
| 1 | Cristiano da Matta | Newman-Haas Racing | Lola B2/00 Toyota | 1:30.204 |
| 2 | Bruno Junqueira | Chip Ganassi Racing | Lola B2/00 Toyota | 1:30.214 |
| 3 | Tony Kanaan | Mo Nunn Racing | Lola B2/00 Honda | 1:30.427 |
| 4 | Kenny Bräck | Chip Ganassi Racing | Lola B2/00 Toyota | 1:30.616 |
| 5 | Paul Tracy | Team Green | Lola B2/00 Honda | 1:30.731 |
| 6 | Scott Dixon | Chip Ganassi Racing | Lola B2/00 Toyota | 1:30.810 |
| 7 | Shinji Nakano | Fernández Racing | Lola B2/00 Honda | 1:30.936 |
| 8 | Dario Franchitti | Team Green | Lola B2/00 Honda | 1:31.040 |
| 9 | Oriol Servià | Patrick Racing | Reynard 02i Toyota | 1:31.087 |
| 10 | Adrián Fernández | Fernández Racing | Lola B2/00 Honda | 1:31.351 |
| 11 | Jimmy Vasser | Team Rahal | Lola B2/00 Ford-Cosworth | 1:31.369 |
| 12 | Michel Jourdain Jr. | Team Rahal | Lola B2/00 Ford-Cosworth | 1:31.709 |
| 13 | Christian Fittipaldi | Newman-Haas Racing | Lola B2/00 Toyota | 1:32.223 |
| 14 | Alex Tagliani | Forsythe Racing | Reynard 02i Ford-Cosworth | 1:32.300 |
| 15 | Patrick Carpentier | Forsythe Racing | Reynard 02i Ford-Cosworth | 1:32.367 |
| 16 | Michael Andretti | Team Green | Lola B2/00 Honda | 1:32.439 |
| 17 | Tora Takagi | Walker Racing | Reynard 02i Toyota | 1:33.922 |
| 18 | Mario Domínguez | Herdez Competition | Lola B2/00 Ford-Cosworth | 1:33.655 |

## Race

| Pos | No | Driver | Team | Laps | Time/retired | Grid | Points |
| 1 | 55 | Mario Domínguez | Herdez Competition | 40 | 2:00:06.524 | 18 | 20 |
| 2 | 32 | Patrick Carpentier | Forsythe Racing | 40 | +2.2 secs | 15 | 16 |
| 3 | 26 | Paul Tracy | Team Green | 40 | +2.5 secs | 5 | 14 |
| 4 | 12 | Kenny Bräck | Chip Ganassi Racing | 40 | +2.7 secs | 4 | 12 |
| 5 | 10 | Tony Kanaan | Mo Nunn Racing | 40 | +4.8 secs | 3 | 10 |
| 6 | 33 | Alex Tagliani | Forsythe Racing | 40 | +7.8 secs | 14 | 8 |
| 7 | 27 | Dario Franchitti | Team Green | 40 | +9.9 secs | 8 | 6 |
| 8 | 1 | Cristiano da Matta | Newman-Haas Racing | 40 | +12.3 secs | 1 | 7 |
| 9 | 39 | Michael Andretti | Team Green | 40 | +13.5 secs | 16 | 4 |
| 10 | 9 | Michel Jourdain Jr. | Team Rahal | 40 | +13.6 secs | 12 | 3 |
| 11 | 11 | Christian Fittipaldi | Newman-Haas Racing | 40 | +14.8 secs | 13 | 2 |
| 12 | 8 | Jimmy Vasser | Team Rahal | 40 | +16.2 secs | 11 | 1 |
| 13 | 52 | Shinji Nakano | Fernández Racing | 40 | +17.6 secs | 7 | |
| 14 | 4 | Bruno Junqueira | Chip Ganassi Racing | 40 | +18.1 secs | 2 | 1 |
| 15 | 44 | Scott Dixon | Chip Ganassi Racing | 24 | Mechanical | 6 | |
| 16 | 20 | Oriol Servià | Patrick Racing | 11 | Mechanical | 9 | |
| 17 | 51 | Adrián Fernández | Fernández Racing | 0 | Contact | 10 | |
| 18 | 5 | Tora Takagi | Walker Racing | 0 | Contact | 17 | |

## Caution flags

| Laps | Cause |
| 0–2 | Yellow start |
| 10–40 | Wet track conditions |