Medi | Zone driver Graham Rahal ran in third place for much of today’s Gran Premio Tecate Champ Car season finale after starting seventh but a late race pass by Oriol Servia dropped him to a fourth place finish which was enough to maintain his fifth place rank in the season ending standings. After the morning standing start practice, Rahal and teammate Bourdais were each penalized 22 seconds of Power To Pass from the original allotment of 75 seconds for laying down rubber in their grid boxes on the front straightaway. Champ Car deemed that it gave them a traction advantage at the start of the race so P2P was deducted as a penalty. Rahal made a good standing start but had to take evasive action to avoid the stalled car of fourth place starter Servia.
Alex Tagliani and Nelson Philippe also stalled their cars at the start and the first of two full course cautions came out to restart the cars. He held seventh place through the restart and moved into sixth on Lap 4 when Robert Doornbos slowed on course due to a clutch problem. Fifth place starter Justin Wilson began to slow his pace and dropped from third to sixth and Rahal was able to easily pass him and move into fifth on Lap 16 which he held for three laps before he had closed on Simon Pagenaud and passed him in going into Turn 1 for fourth place on Lap 20. He made his first of two pit stops on Lap 23 and as the field cycled through their stops, Paul Tracy came back on track as Rahal was passing pit exit and Rahal was able to gain another position and move into third. He held third for the next 21 laps and began closing the seven second gap to second place Will Power. He made his final stop on Lap 46 and returned to the track in third which he held for the next 12 laps and through the second and final full course caution for debris from Laps 55-59 of the eventual 64 lap event.
Prior to the caution he trailed second place Power by six seconds and had a comfortable 11-second lead on fourth place Pagenaud. Once the race was restarted previous seventh place runner Servia, who was on an alternate pit strategy due to stalling on the start and had made his final stop on Lap 49 to Rahal’s 46, charged past Pagenaud and Paul Tracy on the restart and began closing on Rahal. The timing of the caution period benefited his alternate pit strategy and choice of the softer Bridgestone alternate tires versus Rahal, who was on the primary tires that were more durable for longer runs. In addition to being one of the fastest cars on track at the time, Servia also had twice as much P2P as Rahal and utilized it to the full potential when he charged past him to take third on Lap 61 of 64. Rahal trailed by two-seconds seconds but was unable to attempt to regain third place and took the checkered flag in fourth. The 23 points he earned enabled him to keep his fifth place season ending rank with a total of 243. Following are his post race comments:
“Overall it was a good day for the Medi | Zone team, ” said Rahal. “It was good to pass guys and move into the top three. It would have been even better to hold onto third place and end the season on the podium but (Oriol) Servia was on the red Bridgestone alternate tires and I was on the primary ones and he also had more Power to Pass. He closed on me so fast it caught me by surprise. It was impossible to hold him off because he had so much grip. All in all it was good to end the season with a competitive day and run up front most of the race. Obviously I would have had a little better season and catch Doornbos. He had some luck mid season when we had some bad luck. Overall I am happy to finish fifth in the season standings. I am already looking forward to next season. ”
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