DELAYING THE INEVITABLE; Justin Wilson stops Sebastien Bourdais from taking the title in Holland.(Competition)

Byline: ANTHONY PEACOCK

Justin Wilson took his first Champ Car win of the year in Assen, Holland, on a narrow and challenging circuit normally used for motorcycle races. The RuSport driver started from the front row by virtue of setting the fastest time in the opening qualifying session, held in mixed wet and dry conditions.

Wilson made a perfect getaway from second place to launch past pole sitter Sebastien Bourdais, who entered the weekend with a chance of sealing the title. That chance was compromised badly on the opening lap, when he pressed the push-to-pass button and the pit-lane speed limiter cut in instead. In the time it took to reset, Bourdais lost several places.

No sooner had the race started than it was neutralized by a pace-car period after Paul Tracy spun. This also affected Bruno Junqueira, who hit Tracy's car-but not hard enough to slow his pace.

When the race went green, Wilson led Neel Jani and Tristan Gommendy, while Bourdais was stuck in fifth behind Graham Rahal. Wilson did not have it easy, though. He missed the morning warm-up because of an oil-pipe leak, so his engineers had to guess at the optimal race setup.

"I was also hitting the rev limiter through turn 15, as we didn't get the gear ratios quite right,'' he said. "Every lap was inconsistent.''

Junqueira had to pit early, on lap eight, to change a front right tire that was possibly damaged by the earlier contact with Tracy. This put him out of sequence with his rivals, which moved the Brazilian into the lead on lap 16 after the majority of the field pitted during another caution period to clean up debris.