San Jose, Calif. – Sebastien Bourdais drove an almost perfect race on an imperfect track Sunday, pulling away at the end to win the San Jose Grand Prix.
“I think I was in the preferred position, but it was not an easy day,” said Bourdais, who started from the pole and led 63 of the 93 laps on the way to a dominating victory.
The combination of a washboard-like track and looming concrete walls on the narrow downtown street circuit took out half the 18-car field during the 75-minute, timed race Sunday. But Bourdais, the reigning Champ Car World Series champion, managed to avoid the pitfalls and came away with his second victory in a row.
Bourdais attributed his 13th career victory to the work done by his team Saturday night, taking apart the car and virtually rebuilding it in an effort to get him through the rough race.
Even then, he broke a suspension part in Sunday morning’s warm-up.
“The track is really challenging, definitely the roughest one we’ve ever been on,” Bourdais said. “We broke something on the car every time we went on the track. They wanted to make sure the car stayed together.
“The team decided to completely rebuild it overnight. Then, after we broke a suspension piece in the morning, they fixed it and figured out why it happened. The car stayed together all day. It was like a tank.”
Paul Tracy, trailing Bourdais in the season standings, did everything he could to catch the 26-year-old Frenchman, but he came up 3.724-seconds – nearly the entire pit straightaway – short as Bourdais sped up late in the race, turning the fastest laps of the day.
“He only made one mistake in the hairpin, and we weren’t close enough to take advantage,” said Tracy, who slipped from 22 to 28 points behind Bourdais with six races to go in the championship battle.
“I was just following Sebastien at the end,” the 2003 series champion added. “He got faster, so we just decided to follow him home for second place.”
Oriol Servia, Bourdais’ Newman/Haas Racing teammate, was third.
The 1.448-mile circuit presented plenty of challenges, including having to cross railroad tracks at two different places, nearly launching the cars. A narrow left hand turn four also took its toll, with at least five cars bouncing off the wall.
Bourdais wasn’t one of them.
“I made very, very small mistakes, but not enough to open the door for anybody,” he said. “At the end, we pulled away. That was very nice.”
The series moves to Colorado for the Grand Prix of Denver from Aug. 12-14.
Points leaders
Champ Car points leaders after Sunday’s San Jose Grand Prix:
1. Sebastien Bourdais 216
2. Paul Tracy 188
3. Justin Wilson 175
4. Oriol Servia 160
5. A.J. Allmendinger 126
6. (tie) Jimmy Vasser 125
6. Mario Dominguez 125
8. Alex Tagliani 124
9. Timo Glock 109
10. Cristiano da Matta 99
