Mexican Michel Jourdain takes the Centennial 250

Michel Jourdain of Mexico races through turn four during the Centennial 250 at the Milwaukee Mile on Saturday in West Allis, Wisconsin. PHOTO: AP

Nighttime was the right time for Michel Jourdain Jr.

The 26-year-old Mexican driver held off challenges from Paul Tracy and Oriol Servia on Saturday for his first Champ Car victory in CART's first race under the lights.

Jourdain, in his eighth season, pulled away on a restart with 10 laps remaining and beat Servia to the finish line by about three car-lengths to win the Centennial 250 at the Milwaukee Mile.

Jourdain's came in his 126th start and came just a month after he lost a heartbreaker in Long Beach when his gearbox broke during a pit stop with just seven laps remaining in a race he had dominated.

"The two biggest races of my life, one is the saddest and one is the happiest," Jourdain said as tears began to fall. "I almost started crying in the car."

Servia, trying for his first CART win, wound up 0.468 seconds behind at the end of the 250-lap race on the 1.66km oval.

Patrick Carpentier was third, followed by rookie Darren Manning, pole-starter Alex Tagliani and Adrian Fernandez.

Paul Tracy, who came into the race tied with Bruno Junqueira for the CART points lead, appeared to have the best chance of derailing Jourdain's victory.

The Canadian driver, who won the first three races of the season, made a gutsy outside pass on Servia to take second place on lap 170 and was still second when he made his final planned pit stop on lap 213.

Tracy's dropped off the hydraulic jack at the rear of the car too soon and the left rear tire was not fastened properly. As Tracy drove back onto the track, the tire came loose and began bounding down the track.

He pitted for another tire, but he lost too much time and wound up 12th, a lap off the pace. Tracy also fell to second in the standings, trailing new leader Jourdain by 10 points. Junqueira, involved in a first-lap crash, fell to third, one point behind Tracy, who has scored just three points in the last three races.

"You can't win a championship doing things like that," the disappointed Tracy said. "Three races, three points. We need to do a better job as a team."

The race began with temperatures dipping to around 5 to 10 degrees Celsius, one of the coldest days in the 100-year history of the Milwaukee track. Bridgestone, the sole tire supplier for the Champ Car series, said anything under 10 degrees C put the tires into uncharted territory.

CART decided to start the race under a yellow flag to give the drivers a chance to get some heat into their tires. It didn't help.

Moments the green flag came out for the start of lap four, Junqueira spun.

Mario Dominguez clipped Junqueira, who rammed the concrete wall. Roberto Moreno slid into Junqueira and rookie Patrick Lemarie spun through the debris and slammed into Moreno.

Dominguez able to continue, but had to pit twice during the ensuing caution period to replace his front wing. He went on to finish eighth.

Junqueira sent to a hospital for precautionary X-rays after complaining of neck pain.

Rookies Rodolfo Lavin, Joel Camathias and Ryan Hunter-Reay also hit the wall in separate accidents, but the drivers didn't appear to have any further problem with cold tires despite six restarts.

Despite unseasonably cold weather, about 25,000 spectators turned out for the first night race in CART's 25-year history.