Allmendinger wins chaotic race

But he will have to live with the fact that despite being clearly the fastest car/driver combo, the scenes were constantly being stolen by a series of incidents and accidents, frequently the result of over-ambition and basic errors. Thirty-five of the race's 95 laps were under full-course yellow flags.

The most serious incident was the clash in Turn 2 on the opening lap. Newman/Haas Racing's Sebastien Bourdais got tail-happy out of Turn 1, lost momentum, and then appeared to make a slight misjudgement as he tried to fend off Paul Tracy's Forsythe Championship Racing car.

Perhaps not realising Tracy was wheel-to-wheel with Bruno Junqueira on his other side, he squeezed Tracy, whose car went up in the air, and on top of Bourdais. Tracy's car landed with two burst tyres, but Bourdais's car pulled off at the next corner.

His race engineer Craig Hampson confirmed that they heard no word through from Sebastien for the first 40 seconds after the incident and they believe he was unconscious.

However, by the end of the race, the Frenchman had been discharged from hospital.

Tracy and Allmendinger pitted for fresh tyres after their respective incidents, and rejoined the back of the pack, then pitted again as the full course yellow continued while allowing Oriol Servia and Justin Wilson to do battle for the lead.

While Servia would eventually finish third, behind Newman/Haas Racing's second car of Junqueira, Wilson would retire in the closing stages with steering failure.

Junqueira and Servia only made it into the podium positions on the last lap of the race, when Dan Clarke, who had been running third, passed Mario Dominguez of Dale Coyne Racing into Turn 1, but floored the throttle too early as Mario drew back alongside him, and crunched into him.

Fourth went to Alex Tagliani, who also led 18 laps, while Jan Heylen provided some consolation for Dale Coyne with an excellent fifth place.

Pos  Driver              Team                   Time
 1.  AJ Allmendinger     Forsythe Championship  2h 0:22.619
 2.  Bruno Junqueira     Newman Haas            +     3.279
 3.  Oriol Servia        PKV                    +     3.505
 4.  Alex Tagliani       Team Australia         +     6.708
 5.  Jan Heylen          Dale Coyne             +    11.031
 6.  Mario Dominguez     Dale Coyne             +    1 lap
 7.  Dan Clarke          CTE HVM                +    1 lap
 8.  Katherine Legge     PKV                    +    1 lap
 9.  Will Power          Team Australia         +    1 lap
10.  Nelson Philippe     CTE HVM                +    2 laps
11.  Andrew Ranger       Mi-Jack Conquest       +    3 laps
12.  Tonis Kasemets      Rocketsports           +    4 laps
13.  Justin Wilson       RuSPORT                +   18 laps
14.  Cristiano da Matta  RuSPORT                +   20 laps
15.  Charles Zwolsman    Mi-Jack Conquest       +   27 laps
16.  Paul Tracy          Forsythe Championship  +   54 laps
17.  Nicky Pastorelli    Rocketsports           +   73 laps
18.  Sebastien Bourdais  Newman Haas            +   95 laps

Fastest lap: Philippe, 57.508 on lap 91