Scott Dixon Optimistic Heading To Watkins Glen
Jul 02, 2008
Ron McQueeney/IMS
Scott Dixon need only look at the second half of the 2007 IndyCar Series season to make him alternately smile and shudder as it relates to this year’s championship race.
He was 65 points behind Franchitti exiting the Richmond race, but rattled off four victories in the final eight to outscore Franchitti 370-331 and set up a season-ending duel for the series title.
The momentum hasn’t slowed. The driver of the No. 9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing Honda-powered Dallara has eight top-five finishes in nine races, including three victories, and holds a 43-point advantage over Team Penske’s Helio Castroneves at the halfway point of the season. Dixon’s teammate, Dan Wheldon, is 52 points behind.
Dixon isn’t comfortable with the cushion, especially with six of the final nine races on road/street courses. First up is the Camping World Grand Prix at The Glen at the 3.4-mile Watkins Glen International circuit.
“It’s been one of those seasons when things seem to go your way more often than not, from the end of last season and through to this year” said Dixon, who’s won the past three years at The Glen. “It’s even little things like Iowa when we didn’t have the correct car, and we got rained out and got pole (based on entrant points). That definitely helped. Thank God we kind of sorted the car through the race and we were somewhat competitive (finished fourth).
“Hopefully we keep the ball rolling, but I think if you talk about how fantastic you are too much it’s going to fall over on you. It can turn on you pretty quick, so you have to try to ride the wave as long as you can and hopefully it never falls off until we win another championship.”
Dixon’s steady results netted the 2003 title when he was a newcomer to the series, and similar results have bred confidence throughout the No. 9 car crew.
“It does help your confidence going into the weekend,” he said. “There’s a long way to go, so we have to treat each weekend as it is until you get down to those last few to determine where you work out for the championship. Now it’s the time to press on and gain as many points as you can.
“At the moment, I really feel I have to push on the ovals because Helio is extremely strong on the road courses. I think both of us are going to be fairly well-matched at a lot of those places, and that’s almost half of the remainder of the season. It’s those things you put into your mind as well to try to work out where you need to be better than other people. I think you still have to treat it race by race and go for the race win but if you can’t win don’t push it too much that you’re going to lose a ton of points by crashing.”
Castroneves hasn’t forfeited many points though he’s looking for his first victory since April 2007 and his first IndyCar Series title. The No. 3 Team Penske entry has finished in the top five in eight of the nine events, including runner-up four times. Castroneves advanced from 18th on the starting grid to finish second to Andretti Green Racing’s Tony Kanaan at Richmond on June 28.
Kanaan is fourth in the title search (82 points back) and teammate Danica Patrick is fifth (131 behind). AGR driver Hideki Mutoh leads the Bombardier Learjet Rookie of the Year standings and is sixth overall. Marco Andretti, Ryan Briscoe, Oriol Servia and Ed Carpenter also are in the top 10.
As Dixon notes, anyone can put together a run similar to his last year and quickly close the gap. At Watkins Glen in ’07, Castroneves was the pole sitter and led the initial 19 laps before crashing in Turn 11. Dixon, who started second, led the final 17 laps (and 23 overall) to post the victory.
“I want to redeem myself from last year, and we know that we have more competitors,” Castroneves said. “We know we are going to have a lot of guys doing good on road courses—that was proved in St. Petersburg. It’s good for the championship to mix it up a little bit.”
