INDIANAPOLIS — Death. Taxes. Scott Dixon doing Scott Dixon things. On a sun filled Saturday afternoon at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Dixon came from behind to score his 54th career NTT INDYCAR SERIES victory.
Dixon overcame being collected in that Lap 1 incident when Marcus Armstrong and Alex Palou made contact in Turn 1 causing Armstrong to spin. Dixon then spun from behind to avoid the incident while Romain Grosjean then Josef Newgarden piled in.
Dixon was able to continue on without falling a lap down. He pit on Lap 5 to top off and to go to the Firestone alternates. That proved to be ironically enough, the race winning sequence.
Dixon would pit on Lap 32 next then for the final time on Lap 59. By doing so, he cycled to the front and despite a late race dash with Graham Rahal, was able to hold the pole sitter off .4779-seconds for the closest finish in Gallagher Grand Prix history.
Rahal had to settle for second in his No. 15 Dallara-Honda while Pato O’Ward, Christian Lundgaard and Alexander Rossi rounded out the top five in a wild ending.
Dixon Extends Streaks
Scott Dixon broke the ironman record on Saturday topping an iron man himself in Tony Kanaan. This was his 319th straight start which is a new record. It was also extending a previous record of most consecutive seasons with at least one trip to victory lane at 19. He’s won at least one race every year since 2005.
Dixon has won a race in 21 of his 22 years in the sport. It took him until Race 10 to win in Toronto last year and now Race 14 this year.
Saturday was his 200th career top five finish which is most all-time. His 54 wins is second ever, so are his 50 career runner-ups and 134 podiums.
Rahal Felt They Did Everything Right In Runner-Up, Strategy Left Him Off Top Step Of Podium
Graham Rahal could be upset for leading the most laps from the pole in Saturday’s Gallagher Grand Prix. He’s instead taking it in stride. Rahal, despite leading a race-high 36 laps finished runner-up by .4779-seconds in his No. 15 Dallara-Honda.
“For the whole team, as I’ve said numerous times, these guys have worked extremely, extremely hard to get here, to get this organization back on track,” Rahal said. “It’s great to see the fruits of their labor starting to show.
“Being able to go out there and challenge really hard today, I thought we did. You guys see it, not me, I thought what I could see gap-wise we did the best job on blacks by far of anybody today. I knew when Alex or Christian were behind me on blacks, they weren’t anywhere near our pace. I was able to hold Christian off on reds. The guys did a great job of giving me a car I could attack today.
“It’s a shame not to come away with a win, but that’s the way it goes.”
He said it was nice to have a refreshing, straight forward type of day. If not for a longer opening caution, the lone one of the day, and tire strategy, he had this race won. The field was covered as Rahal crossed the yard of bricks by over 8 seconds ahead of third place finisher Pato O’Ward.
“Aside from an eight-lap yellow that didn’t need to be eight laps, that may have had an effect on today. But the reality is that’s the way that these things go,” Rahal rued.
“I don’t know if Pato was thinking the same, the yellow, I asked the guy, I don’t know why we’re not going green. This doesn’t make any sense. I knew when Dixie pitted, I was like son of a… You give the guy an inch, he’s going to get a mile. He’s the best at saving fuel, going fast, doing the things he does.
“It was just that he didn’t have that set of reds that Dixon and others had since they were used in qualifying on Saturday. “
That’s why he went from starting on reds to running blacks the next two stints before the reds at the end. Scott Dixon started on primaries and by not making it out of the first round of qualifying on Friday, had an extra set of reds too.
“I was worried a little last night that we didn’t have three sets of reds to use,” he said. “We had a blister on the left front qualifying set. Not really sure why. It wasn’t a flat spot or anything. Unfortunately it made it so that set wasn’t usable for us today.
“I knew that the two middle stints on black, I was going to have to drive the wheels off of it just to maintain my gap. We were able to do that and actually pull a little bit more of a gap.
“Again, Dixie, through that middle stint, all the stints had reds, just blacks to reds, chasing down the best ever to do this, it’s not an easy thing (smiling).
“We got that last stint, and I knew we were going to have to make a lot of time. Catching him about 7/10ths a lap. Traffic came into play. It is what’s.”
Dixon was able to pit on Lap 5 under caution to top off on fuel and to go from the primaries to the reds and that proved to be his winning move as he went with the alternates the rest of the way.
Rahal hit pit road for the first time on Lap 24, then again on Lap 48. Dixon had the lead after and then hit pit road for his final time on Lap 58. Rahal pit for his final time on Lap 63.
The race between the two was now on.
On Lap 65, it was 6.6803-seconds between Dixon and Rahal. Three laps later, it was down to 4.5750-seconds. Two laps after that, it was 4.0527-seconds. It maintained there until it got down to 2.9094-seconds on Lap 75. Three laps later it was 1.8817-seconds. Four laps later down to .5076-seconds. Then down to .2689-seconds.
He was coming. Dixon had just enough to hold Rahal off as Rahal had to settle for his 33rd career podium.
“Yeah, I thought we did all right today. But that’s the way racing goes. At the end of the day we have nothing to be ashamed of. I thought we laid it all on the line, did a great job as an organization this weekend. To get a podium in a year like this obviously feels good. To get a win would have been better, but that’s the way this goes.”
McLaren Satisfying Day
Back in May, McLaren went 2-3-5 here. They came into Saturday’s race reeling more than they were here a few months ago. At that point, McLaren was rolling. Pato O’Ward had 3 runner-up finishes in the first 5 races. Felix Rosenqvist had three straight top 10’s while Alexander Rossi had 3 top 8 finishes in the first 5 races himself.
Since?
Rossi had 2 top 8’s over the last 8 races entering, Rosenqvist has 3 top 10’s in the same span while O’Ward had just 2 top 5’s, both 3rd place finishes, since as well.
Could they turn it back on this weekend?
In the end, while Felix Rosenqvist dropped out late, they had two more cars in the top five again.
Pato O’Ward finished third after being second in May while Alexander Rossi brought his No. 7 Dallara-Chevrolet home fifth.
“I was pretty happy with my car,” O’Ward said after the race. “Definitely a hot race. I don’t think we could have squeezed out one more ounce of performance out of this car. I wouldn’t have changed the strategy one bit. I think the car balance was great, but we’ve got some catching up to do.”
O’Ward was made mention in the past that this hasn’t always been a strong track for him but to come away with two podiums in two tries, he’s satisfied.
“I’m very proud of myself,” he told me. “The way that I’ve that I’ve raced around here, I’ve taken a massive step forward and Yeah, happy for that.”
On natural road courses this season, O’Ward is thriving. He’s finished 4th, 2nd, 3rd, 8th and now 3rd again. It’s remarkably enough ovals that has had them down and he said they have work to do still heading to World Wide Technology Raceway in two weeks.
O’Ward has finished 2nd, 24th, 3rd and 10th on them. While I feel like he’s being hard on himself, he just wants to win so bad and frustrated that it’s been 20 starts now.
“A fricking win would be great,” O’Ward said.
“I mean, I’ve been driving my ass off every single race. Like, there is nothing more than I want than to get wins. Obviously there’s been little things here and there that have got us out of contention and out of being able to kind of capitalize on that.
“With like the performance of today, I’m very pleased. I’m just tired. I’m just very pleased with today, very happy with how the team and I attacked because I was playing around with Graham in the warm-up, and he was just stronger than me. I know he was. I knew it was going to be a tall ask, just from outright pace, to try and beat them.
“But I was very happy with my car balance. I was very happy with every other call. Yeah, we just got to keep pushing.”
For Rossi, this was his 7th top 7 finish in his last 8 tries here, 6 of which in the top 5. He’s finished 1st, 3rd, 5th in his last three.
“Over the past few races, we’ve experienced a few struggles,” admitted Rossi before the race weekend. “But motorsport is never a straightforward journey; it’s a test of resilience. As we return to the site of our last podium, it reminds us that every race is an opportunity to learn and grow. We’re going to harness that past success.”
Palou Extends Points Lead As Newgarden Struggles
Alex Palou said coming into this past two race stretch of Nashville and Indy Road Course that he was hopeful to score as many points as he could. That’s because he knows what Josef Newgarden is capable of at the World Wide Technology Raceway. He’s won three straight times there and is a perfect 4-for-4 on ovals this season.
It sat at 80 points coming to Nashville and is 101 going to Gateway. That’s a massive win. He gained 26 points on Newgarden in this span which sets him up nicely for his second championship in a three year span.
“Today good championship day,” Palou told me after netting his 42nd career top 10 finish in just his 61st start. “Yeah, obviously, it’s great. I would have liked to have more obviously. But yeah, it’s good. I mean, the target was to try and do the best we can. We had plans for a little bit more, I would say without that last thing. But anyway, it was a good a good rate of return.”
54 points is a max race day. There’s 162 points available for the taking and he holds a 101-point gap. The math says that Palou just needs to maintain just as he did on Saturday.
He said he didn’t have a great car on the reds at the end to fight for much more so he settled for a top 10 instead of risking anything for a top five. He lost a couple of spots there but with what happened to Josef Newgarden early, that was perfectly fine.
“Yeah, I mean, we struggled always honestly, especially the last time with the reds,” he continued. “We seem to be really good on the used reds and then when we saved for the new reds for the end, we expected a little bit more. We couldn’t really get it.
“But yeah, anyway, it’s good for the team with Scott winning and good for the championship.”
Newgarden had an abysmal weekend.
The reigning Indy 500 champion was just 24th and 14th in Friday’s double practice session and only qualified his No. 2 Dallara-Chevrolet in 19th. As a result, they elected to change his engine prior to Saturday’s Gallagher Grand Prix which left him starting in 25th.
It cost him on the first lap as he was collected in that opening lap melee. He fought from behind the rest of the day and came home where he started…25th.
Newgarden has just 1 podium in 14 Indy road course tries too. Out of his last six Indy road course races, he’s led just two laps. He was seventh in May. On natural road courses this season, he’s finished 15th, 7th, 2nd, 25th respectively.
Palou has finished 5th, 5th, 1st, 4th, 1st, 1st, 1st, 2nd, 8th, 3rd, 3rd, 7th over the last 12 races. Newgarden has finished 9th, 15th, 7th, 1st, 10th, 2nd, 12th, 5th, 1st, 1st, 4th, 25th himself.
Penske Lacked Pace
This was a puzzling weekend out of the team. Team Penske has the most Indy road course wins (8) and has the second most wins (9) on natural road courses during the Aeroscreen era. Penske also has the most podiums scored here with 14. They had 8 in the pre Aeroscreen era and 6 since (2020 and beyond).
However, they’re also 1-for-5 over the last two years here and haven’t won the May particular event since 2019. At that time, this was their 5th straight win in the race. They’re 0-for-4 since.
It’s this race weekend to where they’ve been the best at. However, they’ve struggled this weekend in being P6-P20-P24 in Practice 1, P3-P14-P23 in practice 2 and qualifying P11-P17-P19. They’d finish P6-P8-P25.
Race Review Online 