Sebastien Bourdais did what he has been threatening to do all year Monday at Brands Hatch by winning the London Champ Car Trophy over his Newman/Haas Racing teammate Bruno Junqueira in front of a packed house of about 45,000. Mario Domingue improved form continued and the Mexican took a deserved third place ahead of Oriol Servia, Patrick Carpentier and Michel Jourdain Jr.
Reigning FIA Formula 3000 champion Bourdais had shown prodigious speed in his first three Champ Car races, but a series of incidents and misfortunes had relegated him to 16th in the Bridgestone Presents The Champ Car World Series standings heading into CARs two-race European swing.
On Monday at Brands Hatch, Bourdais harried pole man Paul Tracy during the first stint and led 95 of the 165 laps on the way to a dominant win. He took the lead on the first round of pit stops by stretching his fuel an extra lap and used that as a springboard to victory despite a late-race challenge from Junqueira.
It feels great to win my first race here in England Bourdais said after averaging 105.412 mphI won my first Formula 3000 race here and England has been very good to me. We probably should have won the first three races of the season and now we finally did it in Europe
Tracs Playes Lola/Ford-Cosworth began smoking shortly after the Canadias second stop, and on Lap 118, the gearbox let go in a cloud of smoke and flames and the Canadian was forced to pull off the track.
We had issues with the gearbox during the race and sometimes it was shifting by itself Tracy saidThree or four laps before the car caught fire, I heard noise and the car started to smoke a bit. Is never good to give away points like this. Is costly and disappointing to have a DNF
Tracs retirement left Bourdais with an 11-second lead over Junqueira, but the Brazilian was able to cut into the gap when Sebastien encountered traffic in the late stages of the race. Junqueira got the margin under four seconds with 10 laps to go, but he got caught out by the same group of lapped cars and the interval at the checkered flag was 7.835 seconds.
Traffic was a problem here because there is no straight noted JunqueiraAfter the first pit stop I had three lapped cars between me and Tracy and that was the moment that he and Sebastien broke away from me. It took me 20 or 25 laps to pass them and I burned extra fuel while I was trying to do it
Bourdais, meanwhile, proved to be as masterful at saving fuel as he is at producing fast laps.
I never really had to push, except for when I pulled a gap out on Paul after the first pit stop he saidI saved as much fuel as I could and I was even slowing Paul down, but that was the key to doing the race in two stops. I learned to treat saving fuel as a game when I was doing endurance races in sports cars.
The first three races were really frustrating and we came away feeling down Bourdais addedBut now we feel very good and we need to maintain this feeling
Tracy and Bourdais have combined to lead 371 of 445 laps of Champ Car competition in 2003. Junqueira hast led a single lap, but his second place finish Monday was his third podium of the season and moved him within 11 points of Tracy in the standings.
The race was okay Junqueira saidI tried to save fuel but I didt have the pace to catch Sebastien. This race was about saving fuel instead of going fast, but it was important for me to get the points. Is a shame what happened to Paul because I think it would have been an exciting three-car fight to the finish
Dominguez said his podium finish at Brands Hatch was a greater accomplishment than his controversial victory in the rain at Surfers Paradise, Australia in October 2002.
Of course he remarkedLast year the team did a great job to get that win, but this year we all did it. Wve worked hard all season and the Herdez Competition Team deserves this.
Like Bruno said, this race was about saving fuel he addedThe team did a brilliant job with the calculations and I ran out of fuel on the last lap
Servia was fourth fastest in both qualifying sessions and he maintained that position in the race, while Carpentier and Jourdain both gained four places in the race over their qualifying positions.
Aside from a yellow flag at the original start due to a mis-aligned field, there was only one five-lap caution period from Lap 79 to 83 when Alex Yoong ran off-course at the Druids hairpin. Champ Car and Brands Hatch officials announced the three-day weekend attendance as 58,500.
"For a first time event and a race that was put together in well under half a year, it was definitely a great success," stated Champ Car spokesman Adam Saal. "We're already listing what we can do better, but all in all, we're walking away very happy.
"There seems to be an incredible reception for open-wheel or single-seater racing in Great Britain," Saal added. "Obviously it's incredibly popular and fans who have top-category exposure to Formula 1 experienced a strong alternative today."
