DATE: Tuesday, May 27, 1997                 TAG: 9705270150

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY BOB ZELLER, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: INDIANAPOLIS                      LENGTH:   79 lines

AT INDY, IT'S TRY, TRY AGAIN GORDON WILL BE 4TH TODAY WHEN (AND IF) RACING RESUMES AT THE BRICKYARD.

What in heaven's name could NASCAR Winston Cup driver Robby Gordon have told the rain gods to make them so angry at him?

``I have no idea,'' he said Monday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway after his carefully crafted plans to race in the Indy 500 were drenched again.

A second straight day of rain washed out the Indianapolis 500 after only 15 laps, with Gordon running in fourth position. The race, which now boils down to the Indy 462.5, is scheduled to be restarted at noon today.

Even though Gordon spent only a brief time racing his No. 42 Coors Light Indy car, those 15 laps were filled with action.

Gordon charged hard from the moment the green flag fell, moving from his 12th starting position on the outside of the fourth row to fifth at the end of the first lap. By the next lap, he was in fourth and challenging Robbie Buhl.

Gordon went to the outside and they nearly collided in the first turn. So Gordon backed off and was still cruising in fourth when a light rain began to fall, prompting a yellow flag on lap 10.

The rain began falling harder, so the red flag came out on lap 15 and that was it. By midafternoon, when the race was postponed again, the light shower had turned into a cold, drenching downpour.

With Gordon, there seems to be something crazy happening no matter what the circumstances. In the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday night, before he crashed, Gordon was stymied by a cramp in his left calf.

At Indy on Monday, during the yellow flag for the rain, Gordon's safety belt became tangled. He told his crew he might have to pit to fix his shoulder harness. He got it untangled by the time the red flag fell.

Once the race was stopped, Gordon decided to chat with Buhl about their close encounter. That didn't sit well with Buhl's team manager, Larry Curry, who stepped in, grabbed Gordon and said, ``Leave him alone.'' Gordon pushed back, and a fight nearly broke out before tempers settled down.

``It was no big deal,'' Gordon said later.

Just another day at the office.

For a month now, the rain has been falling on Gordon's parade.

It started when the Winston 500 at Talladega was rained out two days in a row. The race was rescheduled for pole day at Indy, so Gordon skipped the Talladega race to qualify here.

Then the rain fell Sunday at Indy. And it fell Sunday night at Charlotte, just a few laps before the halfway point, prompting a three-hour delay. Gordon wasn't around at the end. He had spun and hit the wall in turn 4 just before the rains came.

Gordon wanted to continue in the 600, but car owner Felix Sabates decided that his investment for Indianapolis was too great to risk having Gordon worn out just making laps at Charlotte.

Despite the difficult circumstances, Gordon's determination to win the Indy 500 was unbowed Monday afternoon.

``I'm very comfortable,'' he said. ``I'm excited to see how our car is running. And I'm very confident the car will run 500 miles.''

Some 300,000 people, perhaps 50,000 short of Sunday's rain-soaked crowd, turned out Monday at Indy. Everything ran right on time - until it was time to race. And then things got weird.

As Arie Luyendyk and Tony Stewart were leading the 35-car field to the starting flag, rookie Kenny Brack tangled with rookie Affonso Giaffone, who in turn struck Stephen Gregoire. That left the entire fifth row in pieces scattered across fourth turn of Indy's 2 1/2-mile oval.

During the ensuing caution period, rookie Robbie Groff's engine stopped, leaving him stranded in the middle of the backstretch. Then first-year Indy starter Sam Schmidt drove to the pits with black smoke belching from the rear of his car.

Finally, 14 minutes after the scheduled start, the leaders took the green. Jim Guthrie pulled in on lap 6, his engine overheating. Four laps later, Claude Bourbonnais' engine let go. Alessandro Zampedri than went out with an oil leak.

As the remaining cars drove slowly under the yellow flag, the rain began.

Today's forecast calls for a cloudy, cool day with a 20 percent chance of rain. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Robby Gordon, right, has words with fellow driver Robbie Buhl.

Buhl's team manager took offense, grabbed Gordon, and a fight nearly

ensued.

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