Born into a racing family in Le Mans — his father Patrick raced in touring cars, hill climbs, and sports cars — Bourdais began karting at the age of ten. He won the Maine Bretagne League in 1991 and the Cadet France championship in 1993. In 1996, he was part of the winning Sologne Karting team at the 24-hour Le Mans kart race at the Circuit Alain Prost on a Merlin chassis with Atomic motors.
He progressed to single-seater racing in 1995, finishing ninth in the Formula Campus by Renault and Elf Championship. He spent two years in the French Formula Renault Championship, ultimately finishing second in points in 1997 after winning four races and five pole positions. He won five races to become Rookie of the Year in French F3 in 1998 and won the series outright in 1999 with eight wins and three poles.
Bourdais joined the Prost Junior Team in the International F3000 Championship in 2000, finishing ninth with one pole and a best finish of second. In 2001, he moved to the DAMS team and took his first series win at Silverstone. For 2002, with Super Nova Racing, he won three races and secured seven pole positions, beating Giorgio Pantano to the championship by two points after Tomáš Enge, who had scored the most points, was penalised for failing a drug test.
After his Formula 3000 career, Bourdais signed with Opel to race in the DTM in 2003 — with a contract clause allowing him to leave if a Formula 1, CART, or IRL drive materialised. He tested for Opel but secured a CART drive instead, joining Newman/Haas Racing for the 2003 season. He was paid US $70,000 for that season.
At St. Petersburg, Florida, Bourdais became the first rookie since Nigel Mansell to claim pole position for his very first race. He did not finish higher than eleventh until his fourth race, when he led 95 laps en route to his first Champ Car victory at Brands Hatch. He followed that with a win at the Lausitzring and, with a runner-up finish in Mexico City, clinched Rookie of the Year and finished fourth overall.
Bourdais dominated the 2004 Champ Car series with seven wins and eight poles in his McDonald's-sponsored Lola, beating teammate Bruno Junqueira by 28 points. He recorded podium finishes in ten of fourteen events and qualifying results no lower than third all season.
He successfully defended his title in 2005 with five wins in the final six races of the season. That May, he also finished twelfth in his first Indianapolis 500.
In 2006, Bourdais began with four consecutive victories at Long Beach, Houston, Monterrey, and Milwaukee, but his winning streak was ended by A. J. Allmendinger, who won three races in a row through the middle of the season. An incident with arch-rival Paul Tracy on the final lap of the Denver race knocked Bourdais out; Allmendinger's win narrowed the gap. Bourdais's win in Montreal and Allmendinger's DNF widened his points lead to 62 with three races remaining, and he clinched the championship at Surfers Paradise, becoming the first Champ Car driver to win three consecutive titles since Ted Horn achieved the hat trick in 1948.
Bourdais won a fourth consecutive Champ Car title in 2007 with victory at the Lexmark Indy 300 on 21 October.
In 2002, Bourdais received his first F1 test with the Arrows team and was signed to drive for them, but the team was on the verge of bankruptcy. He also tested for Renault at Jerez that December, but fellow Frenchman Franck Montagny secured the test drive instead.
After several tests with Scuderia Toro Rosso, on 10 August 2007 it was announced that Bourdais would replace Vitantonio Liuzzi as team-mate to Sebastian Vettel. He competed in 27 races for the team across 2008 and part of 2009.
At the 2008 Australian Grand Prix — the first race since the 2001 San Marino Grand Prix without traction control — Bourdais started seventeenth and worked up to fourth before an engine problem ended his race; he was classified eighth, then inherited seventh and two championship points after Rubens Barrichello was disqualified.
At the 2008 Belgian Grand Prix, Bourdais qualified ninth, gained places quickly, and held fifth for much of the race, getting as high as third. As rain fell harder on the last lap, he was overtaken on wet tyres and finished seventh — his best result of the season.
At the 2008 Italian Grand Prix, Bourdais qualified fourth but his car would not select first gear on the grid, forcing him to start from the pit lane a lap down. He ultimately finished a lap behind race-winner Vettel but set the second-fastest lap of the race, behind only Kimi Räikkönen. At the 2008 Japanese Grand Prix, he ran sixth before receiving a 25-second penalty for an incident with Felipe Massa, dropping him to tenth — a decision that drew widespread criticism, including from ITV's Martin Brundle and James Allen, and led the FIA to take the unprecedented step of publicly releasing stewards-only footage to justify it.
Confirmed for a second Toro Rosso season on 6 February 2009, Bourdais partnered Swiss rookie Sébastien Buemi. Despite two points finishes — at the Australian Grand Prix and in Monaco — he struggled against his less experienced team-mate. He struck Buemi's car while avoiding a spun Jarno Trulli in Spain, ending both drivers' races. At the British Grand Prix, a collision with McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen again ended both races. At the German Grand Prix, a mechanical failure followed qualifying last by over a second.
On 16 July 2009, Toro Rosso announced that Bourdais would be replaced from the Hungarian Grand Prix. Toro Rosso's Franz Tost said the partnership had not met expectations. Bourdais was advised by counsel to file suit for breach of contract; Toro Rosso settled with a $2.1 million payment to avoid litigation.
Bourdais first entered the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1999 at the age of twenty, sharing a Porsche 911 GT2 run by Larbre Compétition with Pierre de Thoisy and Jean-Pierre Jarier; the car retired after 134 laps with engine failure.
He returned in 2000, finishing fourth with Emmanuel Clérico and Olivier Grouillard for the Pescarolo team behind the three dominant Audis. In 2001, he shared a Courage C60 with Jean-Christophe Boullion and Laurent Rédon, which retired after 271 laps. He drove the same model in 2002, finishing ninth in the LMP900 class with Boullion and Franck Lagorce. A 2004 entry shared with Nicolas Minassian and Emmanuel Collard retired after 282 laps.
From 2007, Bourdais drove for the Peugeot Sport factory team. He shared a Peugeot 908 HDi FAP with Stéphane Sarrazin and Pedro Lamy, finishing second behind the winning Audi R10 TDi in 2007. In 2009, he finished second again, one lap behind the winning Peugeot. In 2010, a suspension failure halted co-driver Lamy before Bourdais could turn a single lap.
Bourdais was a Ford Performance factory driver from 2016 to 2019, winning the GTE-Pro class at the 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Bourdais made his IRL debut at the 2005 Indianapolis 500. In his first full-time season in the unified IndyCar series in 2011 with Dale Coyne Racing, he finished 23rd in the championship, scoring the fastest race lap at Edmonton. With Dragon Racing for 2012–13, first with Lotus then with Chevrolet power, he finished 25th and twelfth respectively. By 2014 he broke through for two pole positions and one victory.
On 20 July 2014, winning the first heat race in Toronto, Bourdais joined Al Unser Jr. and Ryan Hunter-Reay as the third driver in history of organised motorsport to score open-wheel championship racing victories under three sanctioning bodies (CART, CCWS, and IRL) in North America. He scored five top-5s and finished tenth overall in the 2014 championship.
At Belle Isle, Detroit on 31 May 2015, Bourdais recorded his 33rd American Championship car racing victory, his second of the season, and had the field a lap down at one point at the Milwaukee Mile on 12 July 2015. He finished tenth in points in 2015.
After KV Racing scaled back to one car for 2016, Bourdais managed one win at Detroit and finished fourteenth. He moved to Dale Coyne Racing for 2017, winning the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on 12 March 2017 from last place after a qualifying crash — the first race of the season.
On 20 May 2017, while qualifying for the Indianapolis 500, Bourdais was involved in a single-car accident. He suffered multiple fractures to his pelvis and a fracture to his right hip; surgery was successful but he missed most of the season to recover.
Returning in 2018 with Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan, Bourdais won the Firestone St. Petersburg Grand Prix after Alexander Rossi collided with race leader Robert Wickens — who had led 67 laps — on the final restart. Bourdais described the win as proof he never doubted he would race in IndyCar again. He also won pole at Phoenix, his first on an oval since 2006, and was the only driver to lead laps at each of the first four races of the 2018 season.
Dale Coyne Racing announced on 22 November 2019 that Bourdais would not return for 2020. On 4 February 2020, he joined A. J. Foyt Racing for a part-time 2020 season. He was confirmed full-time for 2021 and at the Long Beach season finale announced that 2021 would be his last full-time IndyCar year, with a focus on sports car racing thereafter.
Bourdais won the Spa 24 Hours in 2002 with Christophe Bouchut, David Terrien, and Vincent Vosse in a Larbre Compétition Chrysler Viper GTS-R. He also won his class at the 2006 12 Hours of Sebring in a Panoz Esperante. In 2009, he set the official lap record at Sebring International Raceway during the 12 Hours of Sebring.
In July 2012, Bourdais won the inaugural Brickyard Grand Prix Rolex Sports Car Series race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, teaming with Alex Popow in the No. 2 Starworks Motorsport Riley-Ford Daytona Prototype.
He won the Rolex 24 at Daytona in 2014 with João Barbosa and Christian Fittipaldi in the Action Express Corvette DP. In 2015, he finished second at the 24 Hours of Daytona and won the 12 Hours of Sebring, both with an Action Express Corvette DP.
In October 2010, Bourdais drove with Jonathon Webb in the Mother Racing Ford Falcon V8 Supercar at the Gold Coast 600. In October 2011, he drove with Jamie Whincup in the Team Vodafone Holden Commodore, winning Saturday's opening race and finishing second in the second race — earning the inaugural Dan Wheldon Memorial Trophy, awarded to the international driver scoring the most points over the Gold Coast weekend; Dan Wheldon had been set to contest the event but lost his life at the 2011 IndyCar season finale the week before. He won the trophy again in 2012. These victories made him the only driver to have won a race at the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit in both Champ Car/IndyCar and V8 Supercars. He participated in the Bathurst 1000 once, finishing ninth with Lee Holdsworth in 2015.
In the Superleague Formula series, Bourdais drove the Sevilla FC car and won on his debut weekend at Estoril in 2009, and won again at Monza. He returned in 2010 for Olympique Lyonnais.
From 2022, Bourdais focused on Cadillac duties, driving for Chip Ganassi Racing in IMSA until 2024, then signing to drive for Cadillac Hertz Team Jota in the FIA World Endurance Championship Hypercar category.
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