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AUTO RACING

Bourdais Wins At Edmonton

Published: Jul 23, 2007

EDMONTON, ALBERTA - Will Power's broken steering rack may have given Sebastien Bourdais just the push he needs to race away with an unprecedented fourth straight Champ Car World Series title.

St. Petersburg's Bourdais won for the first time in four races and regained control of the Champ Car title chase, driving away with Sunday's Rexall Grand Prix of Edmonton after Power had to park his car.

The 28-year-old Frenchman had failed to finish two of the last three races and found himself trailing rookie Robert Doornbos and second-year driver Power in the points standings heading into the eighth of 16 races this season.

But Bourdais got back on track Sunday, winning on Edmonton's City Centre Airport circuit for the second time in three tries.

"It's a great win, a great team effort," Bourdais said. "It was not automatic, but we got it."

He beat 2006 Edmonton winner Justin Wilson to the finish line by 3.947 seconds - about half the final straightaway. Rookies Graham Rahal, Bourdais' Newman/Haas/Lanigan teammate, and Simon Pagenaud were third and fourth, with Canadian favorite and 2003 series champion Paul Tracy fifth.

Bourdais, who came into the race two points behind Doornbos and one back of Power in the closest title fight since 1999, broke it open Sunday. He heads for next week's race in San Jose, Calif., 20 points ahead of Doornbos, 25 in front of Power and 29 ahead of Wilson, last year's series runner-up.

"It's given Sebastien a real comfort zone, and he works very well when he's comfortable like that," Power said. "It makes it tougher on us, but you can see anything can happen in these races. He just has one DNF [did not finish] and we have a good weekend and it's all back together again."

INDY RACING LEAGUE: Scott Dixon escaped a first-lap accident and hung near the leaders before moving in front late to win the inaugural Honda Indy 200 in Lexington, Ohio, for his third straight victory.

It proved to be a particularly happy birthday for the 27-year-old Dixon - and yet another disappointing day for Danica Patrick.

Dixon's win tightened the race in the drivers points standings. He began the race trailing Dario Franchitti, who finished second, by 34 points and trails by only 24 now with five races left.

Dixon, sixth in qualifying, took the lead for good on Lap 77 of the 85-lap race when Franchitti took a delayed pit stop. Dixon was never threatened to the finish, taking his ninth IndyCar Series win. After wins at Watkins Glen and Nashville the past two weekends, he tied the series mark for consecutive victories set by Kenny Brack (1998) and tied by St. Petersrburg's Dan Wheldon (2005).

Franchitti was second - his 11th consecutive top-5 finish - by 2.6917 seconds, with polesitter Helio Castroneves third, Tony Kanaan fourth, followed by Patrick and Darren Manning.

FORMULA ONE: The rain that threw the European Grand Prix in Nuerburg, Germany, into chaos at the start gave Fernando Alonso the edge he needed to win at the end.

The two-time defending Formula One champ had the better setup for the wet conditions during the final laps of the race, and took advantage to squeeze past Felipe Massa of Ferrari by eight seconds on the Nuerburgring circuit.

Alonso closed to within two points in the standings of McLaren teammate Lewis Hamilton. The rookie was ninth, finishing out of the top three for the first time in 10 races this season.