Tracy dominates for Milwaukee victory.

With a trio wins and a grand total of 531 laps led at the Milwaukee Mile already to his credit, Paul Tracy entered this weekend as the most decorated active driver at the venerable one-mile oval in Wisconsin.

And try as they might, none of his current Champ Car World Series rivals could prevent the Canadian Forsythe Racing driver from taking his fourth Milwaukee win in crushing fashion in a rather processional Time Warner Cable Road Runner 225 Presented by U.S. Bank.

In front of a slightly sun blessed if slightly wind-blown and fairly small Milwaukee crowd, Tracy ruled with an iron fist as he led 192 of the day's 221 laps, taking the chequered flag four laps ahead of schedule as Champ Cars 1 hour and 45 minute time limit came into play.

The 2003 Champ Car World Series champion took the lead with a bold outside move that carried him around pole sitter Jimmy Vasser, and then fought off the advances of young A.J. Allmendinger during the waning laps to score his first win of the 2005 season.

Vasser paced the first 18 laps of the day, 13 of which came under caution after defending Milwaukee winner Ryan Hunter-Reay crashed hard in turn two, which necessitated a precautionary trip to a nearby hospital.

However when Tracy breezed by around the outside of Vasser in turn four, his swift disappearance into the middle distance appeared to put paid to any serious challengers for the majority of the day.

Green-flag pit stops caused him to lose his lead momentarily on two occasions, but Tracy easily moved back in front upon completion of the stops and took his seemingly-rightful place at the front of the high-speed procession circling the venerable oval.
Crash.Net columnist Allmendinger made things interesting in the latter half of the race, whittling away on what was once an eight-second advantage for Tracy after his second pit stop. The young American moved to within a couple of car lengths on Tracy on lap 185, shaving the lead to less than a quarter-second just prior to the final set of fuel stops, which started with 20 laps to go.

The stops showed why Tracy's Forsythe Racing outfit is among the most-accomplished teams in all of open-wheel racing as they not only got Tracy's #3 Lola-Ford out with the lead, but also added nearly four full seconds to his advantage over Allmendinger, Newman-Haas Racing's new boy Oriol Servia and Allmendinger's RuSPORT brethren Justin Wilson.

The last round of stops also ended any chance of a top-five run for series points leader Sebastien Bourdais as he exceeded the pit-lane speed limit when entering the pits, earning a drive-through penalty that dropped him off the lead lap.

The lead that the Forsythe team fashioned for Tracy vanished in one flick of starter J.D. Wilbur's hand however, as a yellow flag for debris bunched the field back up on lap 210. Champ Car Race Control had already announced that the event would be run under a time limit, meaning that the field had little more than five minutes to run the last 15 laps.

Tracy took the lap 215 restart ahead of Allmendinger, who was handcuffed by the fact that he had used all of his Power-To-Pass allotment in securing the second spot. Tracy used that to his advantage, using his reservoir of extra horsepower to build a cushion at the drop of the green flag. That cushion ended up telling the tale as the Canadian built a 3.3-second margin by the time the chequered flag flew four laps short of the scheduled distance.

As if to rub in his dominance even more, Tracy ran the fastest lap of the day on his final trip around the Milwaukee oval.

"The car was great all weekend," said the victorious driver, who started from the inside of the third row. "After warm up we knew we would be in good shape. I had a good start and went to the outside to get AJ. I then focused on Jimmy but he squeezed me to the inside so I stayed on his gearbox until the first restart. On the restart we were side-by-side for a lap but I was able to get him in turn four. My car was good in traffic and we were able to cruise all the way."

The second-place finish for Allmendinger established a new career high for the sophomore driver, and propelled him into the top-five in points for the first time in his young career. Servia completed the podium in his first race after replacing the injured Bruno Junqueira in the #2 PacifiCare Lola, earning the sixth podium of his career.

"It was a great race," commented Allmendinger. "The RuSPORT car was very consistent today. Paul (Tracy) is the man on the start, so when I lost the position on the start I wasn't too worried. We were just running along and as the tyres got older we were able to run down Paul. He was stronger on fresher tyres, so we are very pleased with second place. We needed a good run and I'm glad I got one today."

"I'm very happy I had a chance in the PacifiCare car this weekend," stated Servia, who could find himself back in his usual Dale Coyne run Lola by the time the series opens its next race in Portland. "We had a very good car and I'm happy I was able to deliver. The team was happy and I want to be back in the car, it is a really good car."

Wilson ran in the top five all day and has solidified his status as a title threat in 2005 with Saturday's fourth-place finish, marking the third time in as many events this season that the Sheffield based driver has ended his day in the fourth spot.

Polesitter Vasser celebrated his 200th consecutive Champ Car start with a top-five run and was the only other driver to finish on the lead lap.

Bourdais finished sixth to establish a seven-point lead in the points table despite missing his goal of finishing in the top five on a track where he has crashed twice in two prior CCWS appearance.

Mario Dominguez ended his day in the seventh spot, taking advantage of a strong early run that saw him make up five spots in the first six laps of the day. Dominguez was followed by eighth-placed Ronnie Bremer, who led 10 laps and was the top finishing rookie, with Timo Glock and Alex Tagliani rounding out the top 10. Glock's finish gave him a six-point advantage in the Roshfrans Rookie-of-the-Year chase after three events.

The Champ Car World Series will have one week off as the teams prepare for their first set of back-to-back race weekends of the year with a June 19 trip to Portland being followed the next week by a visit to Cleveland's Burke Lakefront Airport course.