Over the weekend, TV3 showed Born Racer, a very interesting, sometimes very moving documentary following Kiwi Indycar racer Scott Dixon’s 2017 season. This was the year he walked away from one of the biggest crashes the sport has ever seen.
One of the central themes of the movie was Dixon’s never-say-die attitude, not to mention his inordinate drive to try and win his fifth drivers’ championship. The title went down to the wire but Scott came up just a little short in the final race of the 2017 season and ended up finishing third in the championship.
Born Racer was released the following year, a mere two weeks after Scott had secured that much longed for fifth gong, winning the 2018 Indycar Drivers’ crown.
Winning five championships was astounding; a feat that put him well and truly up with the greats of the sport. In 2019 he was beaten again by young American Joseph Newgarden for the title, Dixon coming in a distant fourth. But that only made him work harder, and yesterday it all paid off again with Dixon taking an almost unprecedented, sixth Indycar Championship.
In a season marred by the response to Covid-19, Dixon was able to keep his head through all the cancelled events, structure and schedule changes etc to come home the victor. Scott is now only one championship win behind the all time record holder, the legendary A J Foyt.
The race itself was kind of bizarre. Dixon starting eleventh, three places behind title rival Newgarden, made things a little hard for himself. It was always going to be a struggle for Newgarden to clinch the title though. Even if he gained all the available points by winning, taking pole, leading a lap and leading most laps, he still had to hope that Dixon had an issue as the points lead was such that Scott only had to finish ninth to still take the win. By missing out on the point for gaining pole, Newgarden was also making it harder for himself.
The two drivers chose different tyre compounds to start the race, Dixon using the grippier but more fragile ‘Red’ tyres and Newgarden on the longer lasting but slower ‘Blacks’. The first 30 laps of the race were quite measured with all drivers trying to save fuel in order to make only two pitstops during the 100 lap race.
The weather was extremely humid which took a bit of a toll on some of the participants and on lap 37, Australian Will Power collided with one of the concrete walls lining the track causing a full course caution. He later mentioned that they had put another vent on top of the windscreen to try and better cool the driver and it had affected the vehicle’s aerodynamic performance.
As they say in racing, yellows breed yellows, and the ensuing middle portion of the race was besieged by a veritable plethora of them. One was caused by fellow Kiwi Scott McLaughlin who collided with rookie Reenus Veekay while working his way forward to 16th position from his lowly, but understandable starting position of twenty-first. The race was McLaughlin’s first Indycar race and although it was cut short, he was ecstatic about being in the series. “Best day of my life so far” he quipped, before quickly adding, “bar my wedding”!
Following more Safety Car periods, the Lap 53 restart was extremely tense. Dixon managed to execute some nice moves and moved up to 6th place but showed his skill by baling out of another pass attempt which would have ended in disaster and the title probably going to Newgarden had he tried to complete it.
Following the second round of pitstops there were even more Safety Car periods following crashes by a number of other drivers and even a light shower of rain. Commentator Paul Tracy came up with the one-liner of the day with “This is more bizarre than the Tiger King”.
After the restart on Lap 80, Newgarden made a huge move on the two cars ahead of him resulting in him taking the lead, the last thing Dixon wanted to see. Dixon of course showed what he is made of and himself made an impressive set of overtakes to take up P3.
More cautions came and the weirdness wasn’t finished yet with the Honda Safety Car running out of gas and having to pull into the pits itself leaving Newgarden to control the field. Dixon let one car past on that restart but soon was back in third place following a driver ahead missing a turn.
Finally things settled down and Newgarden cruised home for the win. Dixon crossed the finish line in third place, winning his sixth Indycar Championship in the process.
So a huge congratulations to Scott. He is one of the true legends of the sport and at only forty years of age, he must be odds on to take the all-time win record from A J Foyt pretty soon.
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