A Team Play for Sullivan : Auto racing: He taps car of teammate Al Unser Jr., forcing leader to spin out, and wins.

It appeared that Al Unser Jr. would win a record fifth consecutive Indy car race through the streets of Long Beach when he felt a tap behind him.

From his teammate, Danny Sullivan, of all people.

The tap was enough to spin Unser around, allowing Sullivan, Bobby Rahal and Emerson Fittipaldi to slip past. It occurred three laps from the finish of the 105-lap race Sunday and Sullivan held on to become the first driver other than an Andretti or an Unser to win the Toyota Grand Prix.

The incident occurred, not with Sullivan attempting to pass his Galles-Kraco teammate, but in tight traffic at the end of the back straightaway. Hiro Matsushita, five laps behind, was in the fast lane as the four leaders charged toward the 90-degree right-hand corner with the race on the line.

“We were all running together, jockeying for position and looking for a little edge when we came up on the slower car,” Sullivan said. “Al lifted, I lifted and it was like a chain reaction. We were all under braking and I barely tapped Al.

“I was scrambling to keep ahead of Rahal and Emerson and when Al turned in, I was already too far in to change and like I said, we just touched. It’s not the way you want to win, especially when it’s your teammate, but I’m still smiling.”

Rahal had the closest view of the accident and agreed with Sullivan: “At that stage in the race, there was no quarter going to be given and when we got into the corner, everybody was all over the place, braking as hard as we could.”

Rahal, with a victory last week in Phoenix and a third place in Australia, leads PPG Cup standings after three races with 51 points to 48 for Fittipaldi. It was Rahal’s third consecutive second-place finish at Long Beach.

Unser, who had won the last four Long Beach street races, led 54 laps before he was knocked sideways.

“I was trying to protect my line, it got real crowded and someone hit me, I didn’t know who,” Unser said. “They were all behind me. I knew they were close. Matsushita let a whole train of cars get together, but that’s racing. If we had the car working a little better, we might not have let anyone get so close to us.”

Unser managed to get his car turned around and finished fourth.

“I thought it was a whale of a race, and a clean race, and I congratulate all four of them, especially Al,” said Rick Galles, co-owner of both Sullivan’s and Unser’s cars. “I think this is what Indy car racing is all about. I’m telling you, it was exciting out there.”

Sullivan averaged 91.95 m.p.h. for the 1 hour 48 minutes 56 seconds of the race, one of the most competitive ever held on a street circuit.

As did Unser, Sullivan was driving a new Galmer chassis, designed and built for car owners Galles and Maury Kraines in England to make its debut this season.

“The car is still in the development stage, but we know we’re on the right track,” Galles said. “We had a lot of criticism when the car didn’t run well right out of the box, but since then the crew has worked very hard and the way Al and Danny ran today proves that we made the right move in designing our own car instead of buying one off the shelf.”

Although this was the first victory for a Galmer, it was the fifth in a row for Galles’ team. Unser drove a March to win in 1988 and a Lola the past three years. It was Sullivan’s first victory since Laguna Seca in 1990, his last race for Roger Penske. Last year he labored with minimal success driving an Alfa- Romeo for Pat Patrick, but over the off-season he joined Galles-Kraco.

Michael Andretti seemed on his way to scoring Ford’s first Indy car victory in more than 20 years when he led the first 44 laps from the pole. He was so far ahead that he did not lose the lead when he pitted.

On lap 45, however, the new Lola-Ford lost second gear and first Unser and then several others shot past him. Andretti slowed and pulled into the pits.

“It’s a shame, everything was going along great,” Andretti said. “We just broke second gear. On this course, you’re always going in low gear, putting a lot of force on the whole drive train and things can break. We just didn’t have enough miles of testing on the new car.”

It was the end of a dreary day for the Ford camp, which had been elated after Andretti’s qualifying record of 106.251 m.p.h. Saturday.

Mario Andretti, Michael’s father and the winner of the first two Indy car races in Long Beach, took care of the other two Fords when he ran over the back of Eddie Cheever’s car before the first lap was completed.

“I’m just glad Mario didn’t hurt himself,” Cheever said. “I don’t know what he was doing. He must have been going 50 miles an hour faster than I was when he hit the back of my car. He lifted up in the air and was going straight for the wall. I looked up to the right and all I saw was the underside of Mario’s car.”

Both cars were forced out of the race. Andretti’s new slim Lola, the first one produced by the British race car builder for the Newman-Haas team, was heavily damaged while slamming into a tire wall.

Mario Andretti was not available for comment.