TEAM BIO:
One of the longest-lasting teams in all of open-wheel racing, Illinois-based Dale Coyne Racing put together another representative season in 2006 while continuing to provide some of the sport's young talent a chance to prove themselves. Belgian rookie Jan Heylen finished fourth in the rookie standings on the strength of four top-10 runs highlights be a fifth-place finish in Cleveland. Cristiano da Matta started the year with the team, scoring a fifth-place run in Long Beach for the team's best-ever finish in the series' oldest street race, but left after four races, giving the seat up to Mario Dominguez. Dominguez competed in seven of the year's 14 races with Coyne and came one lap from a second-place finish in Cleveland before he was spun out. The Mexican scored a top-five at San Jose but left the team with three races to go, allowing Champ Car debuts for Juan Caceres and Atlantic veteran Andreas Wirth. Six drivers took their turns behind the wheel of the two Coyne cars in '05, including stints by promising rookies Ronnie Bremer, Ricardo Sperafico, Ryan Dalziel and Michael Valiante.
Dale Coyne Racing took a major step forward in 2004, establishing itself as a consistent top-10 squad after adding accomplished driver Oriol Servia. Servia and Tarso Marques, along with Formula 1 veteran Gaston Mazzacane, ran two cars all season, and led by the eager Servia, qualified both cars in the top 10 in just the second race of the season. Servia went on to set many new standards for the team, including scoring the team's first podium since 1996, qualifying in the top five for the first time since 1997 and scoring the team's first-ever top-10 season finish, tying for ninth with Ryan-Hunter Reay.
Dale Coyne Racing fielded cars in Super Vee and Formula Atlantic in SCCA club and pro racing in the 1970s. The team stepped up to Champ Car racing in 1984 and for several years raced with a stock-block engine, making driver/owner Coyne a fan favorite. With the technical expertise of Coyne, the team built its own chassis in 1986, known as the DC-1, but in 1988 Coyne stepped out of the cockpit to concentrate on running the team and was joined by National Football League Hall of Fame running back Walter Payton as part owner in 1994. The NFL legend continued in that role until his untimely death at the conclusion of the 1999 Champ Car season.
In 1997, Michel Jourdain Jr. took over the driving duties for the Payton Coyne team and earned Most Improved Driver honors from his peers for a season which included his then career-best 12th-place finish at Portland and a fifth-place qualifying effort at California Speedway, also a career best. (Jourdain became the youngest driver ever to compete in a Champ Car-sanctioned event in April of 1996 when he started for Payton Coyne Racing at Long Beach at the age of 19 years, 6 months and 12 days.)
In 1998, Dennis Vitolo joined Jourdain as Payton Coyne's second driver, making a career-high 11 starts. Brazilian Gualter Salles started six 1998 events for Payton Coyne as well. The team campaigned five different drivers in three different cars during the 1999 season, with Jourdain starting all 20 events; Vitolo (seven starts) and Salles (one) sharing duties in a second car, and rookies Luiz Garcia Jr. (seven) and Memo Gidley (six) campaigning a third.
Four different drivers competed for Dale Coyne Racing in 2000. Tarso Marques led the team with 17 starts and was joined by Takuya Kurosawa (eight starts), Alex Barron (six) and Salles (six). The team closed the season on a high note, as Marques and Barron recorded career-best finishes of seventh and eighth, respectively, in the season finale at California Speedway.
In 2001, Dale Coyne Racing joined forces with Team PRG to field entries for German driver Michael Krumm and Brazil's Luiz Garcia Jr., and had a best finish of 15th with Krumm in the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. Coyne maintained his status as one of the series' most veteran owners in 2002, giving a pair of drivers the chance to make their Champ Car debuts. He created the All-English Team St. George along with RAC for a wildly-popular run at Rockingham with Darren Manning where the car led 18 laps in front of Manning's home crowd before finishing ninth. He also teamed with J.A.G. Sports to provide Andre Lotterer with a chance to make his first start, with the German rookie finishing 12th in the season finale at Mexico City. He continued the trend in 2003, campaigning campaigned rookies Joel Camathias, Alex Sperafico, Roberto Gonzalez, Geoff Boss and Alex Yoong in the 2003 championship.
