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Scott Dixon storms to victory at Nashville

Heavy rain and a blessing in disguise gives Indy 500 winner a commanding lead in the IndyCar points race.

When Tony Kanaan and the rest of the leaders pitted on Lap 148 of last night’s Firestone Indy 200 at Nashville Superspeedway, the Target Chip Ganassi Racing duo of Scott Dixon and Dan Wheldon took over the top two spots. Heavy rain was heading toward the track and the two former IndyCar Series champions were going to gamble on having the weather kill the race before their current fuel run ended.

But only one of them was willing to roll the dice. In what he believed was a “miscommunication,”  Dixon wanted, but was unable to pit along with Kanaan and the rest. Turns out that the mistake was a good one to have happen — on Lap 166, the yellow came out as the rain came back. Five laps later, the red flag flew and the cars headed to pit road. A short time later, Dixon was given his third straight win in Music City.

Afterwards, he decided to correct himself:

“I guess you could say it wasn’t a miscommunication. It was probably timing that was off. We were coming up when they called they were going to have one more lap to restart or just on the pass around, and I was on the higher side in turn four.

“They came on the radio and said, ‘All right, follow [Kanaan], if he stays out, stay out. If he pits, pit.’ And that was just as I was going by the pit entry. You know, I was too high to try and pull the car down. I think I would have spun out. That was a miscommunication or just a late call probably. It doesn’t happen too often.”

After last Sunday’s race at Watkins Glen — when he booted away a podium finish by spinning out under caution –  the reigning Indianapolis 500 champion wasn’t going to take that chance. But while the fans at NSS were wondering if Dixon and Wheldon’s “strategy” was going to pay off, the former wasn’t worrying about his fuel load going dry.

Before the final wave of stops, Dixon had pitted on Lap 102. He had been able to squeeze out 62 laps on his first run and another 60 on the second. While that didn’t matter as much with knowledge of impending inclement weather, the New Zealander was happy to have that ace in the hole when then-leader Tony Kanaan was dusting him and the rest of the field before a light drizzle brought out the yellow flag at Lap 139:

“I think we had at least another 10 or 15 laps of [fuel]. We’d been saving quite a bit. Definitely, [Kanaan] got a jump on us on that last sort of green stint there. He had some traffic definitely go his way.

“But we were running quite lean because we definitely wanted to keep that in our back pocket. We thought it was going to be raining a lot earlier. But we still had some left, for sure.”

When the green flag came back out at Lap 152, Dixon and Wheldon were leading, while the pit stops had put Kanaan to third, Castroneves to fourth and Patrick to fifth. But Castroneves took the use-at-your-own-risk high line and got by both Patrick in Turn 1, then split Kanaan and the lapped car of Mario Moraes down the backstretch to take the third position.

But no one was able to reel in Dixon and Wheldon, who said that while the season is far from over, everything is falling in place for his teammate like it did for him during his 2005 championship run at Andretti Green Racing:

“Yeah, he’s definitely on a roll. I think when you’re on that roll, like it was a mistake for him to stay out obviously, and he won. He’s very deserving. He works hard. He’s on his game. Any time he gets in the car, he seems to be quick. It seems to be working for him. You know, that’s good for him.”

When the rain came back for good, ESPN cameras caught the dejected looks of Tony Kanaan’s Andretti Green crew on pit road. Castroneves and Kanaan both lamented the rain, but were also happy with what they got.

Castroneves’ move on Patrick and Kanaan will probably go down as the move of the night. He credited everything to “perfect timing”:

“It was one of those moments, I got it right. I passed Danica. Then [Kanaan] was inside. There was a back marker there as well. I just chose the outside lane. The car stayed. It was one of those moves that was very difficult. It could go wrong or it could go right. Thank God it went the right way. And towards the end of the straight, I got a little draft from another guy and just completed the pass.”

Kanaan didn’t appear annoyed about the move on television and he later said that he supported his team’s choice to pit on Lap 148:

“Who can predict the rain? Unfortunately the rain and I don’t get along too well. But, the 7-Eleven guys have great momentum, and the guys at the front know we are coming. I’ll take fourth place today. When it is your year, it is your year. You have to get a little lucky to win the championship, and I got my share of the luck in 2004.”

Indeed, it’s looking more and more like Scott Dixon is in the catbird’s seat for the championship. With his victory, he stretched his lead over Castroneves to 63 markers (more than one race’s worth) as the series goes to Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course next weekend. Dixon won last year’s inaugural IndyCar event there and Castroneves won twice at M-O during his days as a Champ Car driver.

Dixon noted that his victory was good for him in the points, but he also wondered if his third Gibson guitar — the official trophy of NSS — would be the last one any open-wheel driver would get. Rumors continue to swarm that Nashville may be left out in the cold when the 2009 schedule is released later this month.

Unlike the IndyCar championship picture, the chances that NSS will survive on the schedule isn’t as clear. Dixon hoped for the best:

“You know, I think it’s a tough situation. If it is our last time we’re here, obviously I’m not going to like it, because we’ve won here the last three years in a row. I think it’s a fantastic track. We’ve had some very good races. When we keep that high line clean, we can definitely pass a lot.”

The next race on the IndyCar Series calendar is the Honda 200 next Sunday at Mid-Ohio.

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Ana Beatriz makes history as first female winner in ‘Lights’

You’ve got company, Danica.

Brazilian driver Ana Beatriz became the first female driver to win in the IRL’s Firestone Indy Lights developmental series as she defeated Bobby Wilson to take the Sunbelt Rentals 100 at Nashville yesterday afternoon.

The race was delayed due to a thunderstorm, but Beatriz took it in stride. On Lap 33, she was able to pass her Sam Schmidt Motorsports teammate and polesitter James Davison in Turn 3 to take the lead and was able to hold on the rest of the way:

“I think I was two or three tenths faster than [Davison]. But I knew it would be really hard to pass. I tried one time, got washed out. I was planning on being deliberate to really get good exits, try to pass him. One time I did it, was perfect, I could pass him and pull away from him.”

With her win, Beatriz jumped up three positions in FIL points to third, 39 points behind leader Richard Antinucci (12th on the day). Raphael Matos is second in the championship, 15 markers back of the American.

The FIL will stage a double-header this weekend at Mid-Ohio.

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All quotes used in this article were taken from yesterday’s trackside report and post-race press conferences.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 13th, 2008 at 10:33 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.