Like he had done earlier in the day to Dixon, Hornish took less than a lap to blow by Wheldon and retake the lead following the final restart of the day on lap 186 and although Wheldon remained stapled to the leaders gearbox for the remaining laps, he didn't have the oomph to make a decisive move for the lead.
Hornish's scant 0.07-secs margin of victory allows him to unofficially take the IRL points lead for the first time this season after his teammate Helio Castroneves had a fraught run to sixth place.
The Brazilian driver was lucky to finish the race at all after an early brush with the turn four wall resulted in him losing his rear wing. Incredibly his #3 Penske team were able to repair the offending item under caution without losing a lap and Castroneves was able to claw his way back up the leaderboard to take a top six finish, limiting the damage to his title hopes.
The race was largely a three-horse affair with Hornish and the two Target cars running well clear of the chasing pack for most of the day. Dixon would be sucked into the battle for third in the closing stages however and lost the final podium spot to Panther Racing's Vitor Meira in the final laps with a fast starting Tony Kanaan completing the top five after a poor qualifying effort on Saturday.
Behind Castroneves Tomas Scheckter and Kosuke Matsuura were the only other lead lap finishers with rookie pairing Marco Andretti and Jeff Simmons rounding out the top ten both one lap adrift of the leaders.
Danica Patrick finished eleventh, two laps down to Hornish with Dario Franchitti and unspectacular 12th and Eddie Cheever 14th in what could be his final race pending extra sponsorship.
Rice and Sharp were the only two drivers to suffer terminal damage against the concrete walls, both coming to grief in turn four, while Ed Carpenter and Felipe Giaffone both fell by the wayside with mechanical problems.
