Motor Racing: Mishap as Mansell takes inside track

NIGEL MANSELL finished 10th in the Vancouver IndyCar race despite leading for almost 40 laps. He crashed on the last lap when attempting to overtake Emerson Fittipaldi for fourth place on the final turn. Fittipaldi, who did not see his rival on his inside, slammed the Englishman's car into a concrete barrier.

Fittipaldi, who finished ninth, said after Sunday's race: 'I'm very disappointed a champion like Nigel would do something like that. He tried to stop his car with my car. He tried to pass me in an impossible place.'

Not surprisingly, Mansell, the defending champion, disagreed. 'I went down the inside and he had the choice of letting me go or crashing. So, we crashed.'

In a race full of incident Al Unser Jnr overcame a severe bout of food poisoning to claim his third consecutive win, his eighth of the season. 'I'm pretty sore inside, but winning makes you feel a lot better,' he said.

Unser finished 2.24sec ahead of Robby Gordon with Michael Andretti third. With three races remaining in the series, Unser has a commanding 56-point lead over Fittipaldi.