LEXINGTON, Ohio (AP) Because of CART's new television contract, Sunday's Grand Prix of Mid-Ohio is likely to be the longest of the 21 races the series has run at the Ohio track.

CBS is scheduled to televise the race from 12:30-3 p.m. EDT. The telecast will be a half-hour longer than previous showings of CART events at the track, so the race has been lengthened to 92 laps or 2 hours, 15 minutes, whichever comes first.

If all 92 laps are run, the race will be 209.5 miles. Previous CART events at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course were 200 miles (88 laps) at the most, and for the past eight years, they had been shortened to 186.4 miles (82 laps) to make sure they'd fit a two-hour television window.

Two of the top three qualifiers said they preferred the shorter distance.

"Personally, I think the races are getting a little too long," said points leader Cristiano da Matta, who qualified third.

"I would prefer to have the races a little shorter, like it used to be. I think we talked about that in the drivers meeting, and most of the drivers actually prefer it that way.

"We have road races over two hours, two hours and 10 minutes. Normally the time for those things is an hour and half or an hour and 45. It makes a difference for equipment, for reliability on the cars, engines and everything. It changes it a little bit. It's not so much of a sprint."

The potential for a 90-plus degree day Sunday, combined with the length of the race, concerned polesitter Patrick Carpentier.

"If it's really hot on Sunday, I think it's going to be a really tough race," he said. "It's a longer race, but the pace, unfortunately, doesn't seem to be coming down at all. It's like every lap's a qualifying lap. You run pretty hard."

PAPIS' PROGRESS: Replacement driver Max Papis qualified the car usually driven by the injured Adrian Fernandez in 14th place and said his performance left him with mixed feelings.

"Overall, we progressed every session and improved the setup of the car," Papis said. "You can't really be happy with 14th position, but we have to be happy with the progress that we made. I think we found a better direction to run the car and that is something very encouraging for the future."

Fernandez broke his hip two weeks ago in Vancouver, British Columbia. He's resting this week in Arizona and hopes to be back for next Sunday's race at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wis.

Tom Anderson, co-owner and managing director of the Fernandez team, said Papis' ride was a one-shot deal, but held out some hope that "Mad Max" might be back next year.

"The equipment we have right now won't allow us to expand to a three-car team on short notice," Anderson said. "But that could change over the winter, and we'd love to have Max if there's a way to do it."

Papis competed in the first five races this season before his Sigma team ran out of money.

ROUGH DAY FOR RAHAL: The two cars of Team Rahal, the track's ``home team," will be in the back of the 18-car starting field, with Jimmy Vasser qualifying 13th and Michel Jourdain Jr. 16th.

"I can't pinpoint one thing with the car that is bad," Vasser said. "Obviously, we are well off the pace right now. I can't blame it on the track or slippery conditions because other guys went quicker. We'll just have to improve the car for the race."

Jourdain had one of three cars to take the track for the first half of the final qualifying session and said it might have been better to wait.

"We might have gone too early in qualifying today," he said. "The grip just wasn't there on the track. There seemed to be a lot of grass and other debris. I felt the car was better and we picked up a second and a half from Friday. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough."

Team Rahal is based in suburban Columbus, about 60 miles from the track.

WINNING 'STREAK'?: If Carpentier wins and celebrates the victory the way he said he might, things could get awfully interesting.

"If I win another race, I'm going to run the track naked or something," he said in a television interview upon exiting the car just after he'd clinched the pole position.

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