ASSEN, Netherlands — Justin Wilson won the Bavaria Champ Car Grand Prix Sunday at the TT Circuit Assen, elevating himself from fourth to second place in the Champ Car World Series standings.
It was the first season victory for the 27-year-old Englishman and the fourth triumph of his career.
The victory was also the first for RuSPORT Racing since Champ Car series co-owner Dan Pettit acquired the Colorado-based team from Carl Russo. There was plenty of uncertainty about the RuSPORT group’s future early in the year, and Wilson struggled in testing until the team entered a technical partnership to pool data with Rocketsports Racing and driver Alex Tagliani.
As summer rolled around, Wilson got closer to the pace inevitably set by Sebastien Bourdais in qualifying. But he still was often unable to keep up in races, when Bourdais’s peerless ability to run fast while saving fuel helped him rack up six victories for Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing so far this year.
Bourdais had pole position at Assen, but Wilson beat him in the long drag race from the standing start to the first turn. Once in front, his only challenge came from Bruno Junqueira, whose lap-eight flat tire turned into an advantage because it put the Brazilian onto a different pit-stop sequence that allowed him to lead 30 laps.
Bourdais dropped to sixth place on the opening lap, suffering from an electronic glitch on his Cosworth engine that gave him the pit lane speed limiter when he pressed “Power to Pass.”
The Frenchman stalled the engine leaving his final pit stop and finished the Assen race in seventh. He now holds a 58-point lead over Wilson with two races to go; Dutch hero Robert Doornbos, who finished 13th on Sunday to drop 63 points back, is the only other driver with a mathematical chance of stopping Bourdais from clinching a record fourth consecutive Champ Car title before he departs for Formula One in 2008.
With Bourdais struggling for a change, Wilson was only too happy lead the charge of those picking up the pieces. He regained the lead for good after making his final pit stop on lap 51 of 69 and won by 7.226 seconds over Jan Heylen, with Junqueira third.
“I was definitely concerned at some points during the race that Bruno might be able to get the lead,” Wilson remarked. “But I just stuck to my plan of trying to save fuel and I let Bruno pull away. When it was time to go, I felt pretty good. The car was working well and the faster I went, the better the balance was.”
Wilson credited RuSPORT engineer Mike Talbot for an untested race setup due to a gearbox oil leak in the Sunday morning warmup. The Englishman said his only problem was a short top gear that had his car frequently hitting the rev limiter in the long flat-out run to the final chicane before the start finish line.
“Circumstances worked out for us today,” Wilson said. “We weren’t particularly confident but figured we had nothing to lose. I think we worked out what we had done wrong with the setup and I guess our predictions worked out. I could see Jan was quick, and he was quick where I was weak. I had to work hard to make sure I didn’t hit the rev limiter too hard and lose momentum.”
Heylen didn’t have the speed at the end to challenge for the win, but second place was still the best result in Champ Car for the second year driver from Geel, Belgium. It was also Conquest Racing’s best finish since joining the Champ Car series in 2003.
“Finally!” exclaimed Heylen. “It was time for all the bad luck to change and I’m so happy for the team and all the sponsors involved. Everyone has done an amazing job for the budget we have.”