Date 26 October, 2003 | Official name Lexmark Indy 300 | |
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Location Surfers Paradise Street Circuit
Queensland, Australia Course Temporary Street Circuit
2.795 mi / 4.498 km Distance 47 laps
131.365 mi / 211.406 km Weather Thunderstorms with temperatures reaching up to 27.4 °C (81.3 °F) | ||
The 2003 Lexmark Indy 300 was the eighteenth round of the 2003 CART World Series season, held on 26 October 2003 on the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit, Queensland, Australia. A hail storm 20 minutes into the race caused an hour long red flag period and shortened the race to 47 laps from the scheduled 65.
Ryan Hunter-Reay won the race, his first victory in top-level American open wheel racing. Neither of the two drivers who could still win the season championship, leader Paul Tracy and second-place Bruno Junqueira, finished in the Top 12 points-paying positions (though Junqueira received two bonus points on the weekend: one for having the fastest lap in Friday qualifying, and the other for leading the most laps in the race), meaning Tracy had a big enough lead to clinch the championship with one race to go.
Final CART event
The event was to have been the penultimate race of the 2003 season, but it later became the final round after the 2003 King Taco 500 was canceled because of a wildfire near to the California Speedway venue. In December 2003 the CART World Series declared bankruptcy and as a result went out of business. Therefore, this race became the final completed CART sanctioned event, although the series would be reborn under new ownership as the Champ Car World Series in 2004.