Tracy criticises officials

Tracy lost time behind former F1 driver Gaston Mazzacane early in the race, but the real damage was done by his countryman Alex Tagliani. Representatives from Forsythe Championship Racing brought the matter to Champ Car's attention with no response.

Tracy called for Champ Car's chief steward Chris Kneifel and starter J.D. Wilbur, whose race starts have come under fire several times over the last two years, to be fired.

"Change the chief steward and the flagman - that's the solution," Tracy said. "The flagman was showing blue flags very rarely and when he did show them, it was with no authority. I spent 12 laps stuck behind Tagliani.

"We keep talking over and over in the drivers meetings about guys obeying the blue flags, but if they don't even show them, it's not on the driver. It's really down to the officiating."

Tracy's problems in the race came after a questionable call in qualifying that essentially cost Bruno Junqueira a chance to claim pole position. Junqueira and rookies Mazzacane and Alex Sperafico were deemed guilty of blocking and stripped of their fastest qualifying laps.

"There have been a lot of judgements that have been made for sometimes no reason, whether it's full course yellows or penalties in qualifying or whatever," said Tracy. "And when something is critical in the race, it seems to be either no call, or there's sometimes a lot of full course yellows for no reason. It's just very inconsistent.

"I'm not the first person to say that, and I'm sure I'm not going to be the last. This is not the first time it's been brought up over the last 13 years that I've been in this series that the officiating is inconsistent."