Although he had not received the usual warning from race control, Castroneves was ordered to allow his rival to pass on the following lap, costing himself ten vital championship points as he was then unable to repass the NHLR machine before the end of the two-hour timed race.

“Helio slid a little bit through turns ten, eleven and twelve,” Wilson reported, “When he went into twelve on the brake, he overshot, while I went back to the inside and got some great traction.

"Before we even got to full power, I was inching alongside him and thought 'this is pretty straightforward - by the time we hit the brakes, I'm going to be axle to axle, I'm on the inside, it's clear cut'.

"I was surprised he came over - but then he came over more, to the point I had to lift or we were both going to crash. I was a little upset at the time, but I was relieved when the officials put it right."

Given the context of the championship, however, Wilson admitted that he had been surprised to be given the call to pass Castroneves, and said that he could sympathise with his rival's actions.

"If I was in his position and you so desperately want to win for the championship, then maybe I would have done the same thing," he conceded, "The outcome would have been the same - you just have to do what you feel is right in that split second.

"[The call] was a little bit surprising but, in my mind, it was so clear and so obvious that I think something had to be done. I was very pleased. I knew, in my eyes, I had to make a decisive move, as I didn't want to get tangled up with Helio.

"I'm not trying to get in the way of the championship, but I am trying to win out there. And people come to see a race. They don't want to just see guys driving around. So that was my opportunity to race, and I was pretty frustrated it didn't actually get to a proper overtaking manoeuvre."

The victory, coupled with Mutoh's second poor road course result in as many weekends, moves Wilson to within 13 points of the Japanese driver's rookie series lead. Although he says he is not thinking about the possibility of overhauling the Andretti Green driver in the season finale at Chicagoland Speedway - where Mutoh is expected to hold the upper hand given his oval racing background in the IPS - the Briton admits that he will go there on a high after his success in Detroit.

"We've had so much happen this year, and there have been a lot of occasions where I felt we were in contention for at least a podium if not a win and things haven't gone our way," he admitted, "But you've got to keep picking yourself up and moving on and I'm very happy to have finally got a win this year.”