Bourdais wins again at Long Beach

This was Bourdais's third Long Beach win in a row, and the he lay the foundation to his victory in the opening laps, when he held off fellow front-row starter Will Power and the pair of them pulled away from Alex Tagliani.

When Tagliani put his RSPORTS car ahead of Power's Team Australia machine on a restart after a full course yellow, this worked even further in the Frenchman's favour, as Tagliani headed a convoy of cars but did just enough to keep Power behind him.

In the mean time, Servia - initially running a completely different strategy - was carving through from his 14th position on the grid, and a full course yellow worked in his favour.

Such was Servia's pace that when he found a clear track, the Spaniard was able to make up a huge chunk of time and emerge from his pitstops ahead of the Tagliani convoy.

Another full course yellow for Simon Pagenaud's Team Australia car put Servia within fighting range of Bourdais, who was held at bay by Tristan Gommendy's PKV Racing machine, running an even more ambitious strategy than Forsythe's.

Once Gommendy had to pit, however, Bourdais was released and found a pace Servia couldn't match.

When Alex Figge hit the wall hard in the Pacific Coast Motorsports machine, bringing out another full course caution, there were only two laps left, and Bourdais had it all in hand.

In the course of the last lap, Tagliani was attacked by both Power and RSPORTS teammate Justin Wilson who looked sporadically fast today, and the Canadian slipped from third to fifth.

Bruno Junqueira scored Dale Coyne Racing's second top six finish on the trot with a calm and composed drive.

Pos  Driver      Team                           Time
 1.  Bourdais    Newman/ Haas/ Lanigan Racing   1h40:43.975
 2.  Servia      Forsythe Championship Racing   +     2.614
 3.  Power       Team Australia                 +     3.866
 4.  Wilson      RSPORTS                        +     5.325
 5.  Tagliani    RSPORTS                        +     6.179
 6.  Junqueira   Dale Coyne Racing              +     6.394
 7.  Jani        PKV Racing                     +     7.710
 8.  Rahal       Newman/ Haas/ Lanigan Racing   +     8.267
 9.  Dalziel     Pacific Coast Motorsports      +     8.962
10.  Legge       Dale Coyne Racing              +     9.886
11.  Gommendy    PKV Racing                     +    10.335
12.  Clarke      Minardi Team USA               +    1 Lap
13.  Doornbos    Minardi Team USA               +    4 Laps
14.  Pagenaud    Team Australia                 +    5 Laps
15.  Halliday    Conquest Racing                +    6 Laps
16.  Figge       Pacific Coast Motorsports      +    9 Laps
17.  Dominguez   Forsythe Championship Racing   +   69 Laps