ESPN Racing

LONG BEACH, Calif. -- Co-drivers Gil de Ferran and Simon Pagenaud raced to their first American Le Mans Series victory Saturday.

The duo won a duel of new Acura prototype LMP1 sports cars, holding off a car driven by St. Petersburg winners David Braham and Scott Sharp until a full-course yellow for a car fire forced the 100-minute race on the temporary street circuit in downtown Long Beach to end under caution.

Former open-wheel star de Ferran, in the car at the finish, came out of retirement midway through last season to start his own ALMS team. He and Pagenaud did not win while racing in 2008 in the LMP2 category. Former Indianapolis 500 winner de Ferran's last victory came in 2003 at Texas in his last IndyCar Series event.

There were only 6 minutes left in the race when a GT2 Corvette driven by Boris Said burst into flames and filled with smoke. The veteran racer scrambled out of the cockpit and across the track as safety workers sprayed the car with fire extinguishers.

Said was not injured, but ALMS officials were not able to clean up the mess in time to restart the race.

Brabham cut de Ferran's lead from 16 to 9 seconds before the fire brought out the full-course caution.

Mechanical problems took the new de Ferran car out of races earlier this season at Sebring and St. Petersburg, but the Acura ARX 02a was flawless Saturday on the 1.97-mile, 11-turn circuit.

A LMP2 Acura co-driven by Adrian Fernandez and Luis Diaz finished third and won its class for the third straight race this season.

Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press

This story is from ESPN.com's automated news wire. Wire index