All year long, the Champ Car World Series drivers and teams chasing Sebastien Bourdais (#1 McDonald’s Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone) have been hoping that the two-time defending series champion would run into some bad luck that would allow them to get back into the title hunt.

Well, one out of two isn’t bad.

Bourdais finally saw Lady Luck deal him a card from the bottom of the deck on a sunny Sunday at the Milwaukee Mile, dropping him a lap down to the field just 20 laps into today’s Time Warner Cable Road Runner 225, but the Newman/Haas Racing squad never missed a beat. Bourdais needed just nine laps to get back on the lead orbit, was back in the lead by Lap 101 and had almost lapped the field after another 50 trips around the 1.032-mile oval.

At the end of the day though, he needed one more strong burst to fight off Justin Wilson (#9 CDW Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone) and Nelson Philippe (#14 CTE Racing – HVM Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone) on a Lap 166 restart to roll to his fourth consecutive victory of the season. Bourdais ran the fastest lap of the race just two laps after the restart and beat Wilson to the checkered flag by 3.613 seconds. The win is the fourth in as many starts this season for Bourdais and the 20^th of his career. He scored the maximum 34 points available over the weekend and widened his championship lead to 31 points over Wilson.

Wilson ran to his third runner-up finish of the season by finishing second today, settling for the runner-up spot after leading 61 laps on the day. Even with a few different strategies taking place on the tricky Milwaukee Mile, Bourdais, Wilson and Philippe were the constants on the day. Philippe scored the first podium of his young Champ Car career and managed his best-ever series finish with a third-place run, vaulting him four positions in the championship standings.

Bourdais suffered a punctured right-rear tire on Lap 20, knocking him out of the lead and giving the point to A.J. Allmendinger (#10 RuSPORT Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone). He lost a lap in changing the tire but he caught a break six laps later when Dan Clarke (#4 CTE Racing – HVM Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone) spun and stalled, bringing out the caution that would help Bourdais undo some of the damage done earlier. Wilson made the move that would eventually give him the lead during the first round of pit stops when his RuSPORT team got him out ahead of teammate Allmendinger, but Champ Car history was being made at the front of the grid.

Rookie Katherine Legge (#20 Bell Micro Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone) was running fourth at the first caution and eschewed the chance to pit during the yellow-flag period, becoming the first female driver ever to lead a Champ Car race. Legge did more than just lead once the green flag waved as she fought off Wilson’s advances for 12 laps before finally yielding to the RuSPORT driver.

Bourdais found no easy passage in his march back through the field, wading through a number of hard-fought battles that forced him to earn every inch of track that he gained. Philippe posed the toughest of those conflicts, roaring back after being passed for fourth on Lap 72. Bourdais passed Philippe and was giving chase to Oriol Servia (#6 Gulfstream Ford-Cosworth/Lola/Bridgestone) when Philippe stormed back and went wheel-to-wheel with the two-time champ for four laps. Meanwhile out front, Wilson was taking advantage of Bourdais’ skirmishes, building a lead of nearly 14 seconds before he had to pit on Lap 100.

Bourdais inherited the lead as the front-running cars pitted for fuel, and immediately sprinted away from the field. Building his lead with every lap, Bourdais was able hang a full lap on the entire field before pitting on Lap 128, allowing him to come out on track a full 10 seconds ahead of the second-placed Wilson.

Bourdais widened his lead to nearly a full lap, holding a 21-second lead on a track were race laps take 23 seconds, but saw it erased when the canary banner flew for debris on Lap 152. The caution brought Wilson and Philippe right to points leader’s rear wing, but Bourdais was equal to the task and roared away to the win, becoming the first driver since 1964 to win as many as four consecutive races to start the year.

Allmendinger ended up in the fourth spot on the day, boosting him into the top-five in the season standings after four races. Servia ended up fifth with his PKV Racing teammate Legge came home in sixth, marking the best finish ever for a female Champ Car driver in the 98-year history of the series.