Dixon Gets First Win of the Season

Scott Dixon finally earned the top step of the podium, winning the Road Runner Turbo Indy 300 at Kansas Speedway.
Dixon Gets First Win of the Season
Scott Dixon led most of the race and earned his first win of the season. (James Fish/The Epoch Times)
4/26/2009
Updated:
10/1/2015

<a><img src="https://www.theepochtimes.com/assets/uploads/2015/09/dixon.jpg" alt="Scott Dixon led most of the race and earned his first win of the season. (James Fish/The Epoch Times)" title="Scott Dixon led most of the race and earned his first win of the season. (James Fish/The Epoch Times)" width="320" class="size-medium wp-image-1828559"/></a>
Scott Dixon led most of the race and earned his first win of the season. (James Fish/The Epoch Times)
Defending IndyCar champion Scott Dixon finally earned the top step of the podium, winning the Road Runner Turbo Indy 300 at Kansas Speedway. Dixon took the lead on lap nine and only relinquished it for pit stops, winning the race by a comfortable seven-tenths of a second.

The weather at the Kansas Speedway was the toughest competition, as 25-mph gusts blew cars off the line through turns Three and Four. The gusts made the cars dangerously unstable all the way around the track, upsetting the delicate aerodynamic balance needed to run at maximum speed. Then, two-thirds through the race, the wind dropped by half, leaving many drivers with the wrong setup.

Helio Castroneves and Dario Franchitti had to start at the back of the pack because their qualifying runs were disallowed when they crossed the boundary line at the bottom of the track. Vitor Meira was also relegated to the rear, as his car failed tech inspection.

Helio drove an amazing race, working his way through traffic to finish second. His race nearly ended on lap 13, when Hideki Mutoh cut sharply in front of Vitor Meira, causing Meira to brake hard. Helio rammed Meira, putting Meira out of the race and breaking Helio’s right front wing completely off. Luckily for Helio, his pit crew was able to replace the entire nosecone without losing a lap, allowing Helio to continue his charge towards the front.

Robert Doornbos made a great pit stop while the safety crew cleaned up the debris from the collision. He left the pits ahead of the field and could have taken the lead, but he got a little too eager and fishtailed a bit leaving his pit box, hitting one of the replacement tires on the ground in teammate Graham Rahal’s adjacent pit. Doornbos was sent to last place for the safety infraction.

Tony Kanaan passed Rahal for second place on lap 56; shortly after Ryan Briscoe also passed Rahal. Dixon kept a comfortable half-second lead. On lap 96, Briscoe passed Kanaan to take second.

On Lap 96, Raphael Matos lost downforce when he hit the headwind and the wash off of Mario Moraes’ car coming through turn Four. Ryan Briscoe emerged from the pits with the lead, followed by Tony Kanaan and Scott Dixon.

Briscoe held the lead, while behind him, Helio Castroneves worked his way up, eventually taking second on lap 127. Kanaan and Dixon followed, while behind them Franchitti in seventh chased Danica Patrick in sixth who was chasing Rahal in fifth. Danica brushed off Dario on a slower car at lap 140, and opened a gap. Her car seemed to be running better as the race went on; by lap 144 she was almost onto Rahal.

On lap 152 race leader Ryan Briscoe headed for the pits. At the same time, Rahal dropped down towards pit lane and slowed abruptly. Dario Franchitti also decided to pit, but came in too fast; he nearly hit Rahal, but in avoiding him, careened across the track and slammed into the safety barrier. This put an end to Dario’s drive—he had come from the back to as high as seventh, a fine effort. The accident also brought out a full-course yellow.

This proved to be terrible timing for Briscoe. When the yellow flag was waved, he was a tenth of a second from crossing the official pit entry timing line—well past the yellow line demarking the entry to the pits, but a few yards shy of the electronic timer. He was judged not to have actually entered the pits, which automatically close for one lap after a full-course caution. Briscoe was forced to drive through the pits and reenter on the next lap. This unfortunate break cost him a lot of time and arguably cost him the race.

“It’s one of those deals,” Ryan Briscoe said. “I knew we had the car to win today, and we had the track position until that happened. It’s really unfortunate. We’ll take the points and go forward.”

The green flag waved on lap 159, and for the rest of the race, everyone drove flat out to win. Fuel conservation was no longer an issue, and everyone had fresh tires; plus the wind had dropped, allowing cars to run three wide through the turns. Graham Rahal took advantage of finally having a good-handling car to move up from tenth to seventh, occasionally challenging Michael Andretti in sixth.

The top five: Dixon, Castroneves, Kanaan, Briscoe, and Patrick—held their positions for the final forty laps. Tony Kanaan had too much downforce to get by Castroneves. “We needed the downforce to get to the end,” he said later, “but in the end we had too much downforce.” Though he could only manage third, Kanaan moved to the lead in the championship.

Graham Rahal said, “My car was pretty good in One and Two but down in Three and Four I had a lot of understeer. I got passed by three guys today and that’s how all of them got me.”

Danica Patrick praised her pit crew: “They did a great job on that last stop. I was behind that lead pack, and they got me a couple places.” She mentioned that even at the end, she couldn’t pass Ryan Briscoe because the wind in turns Three and Four would push her car right off the track.

“We made improvements every single session, and again, from this morning I really look forward to the next one [the Indianapolis 500].”

 Final Results: Road Runner Turbo Indy 300

Place

Driver

No

Difference

Status

1

Scott Dixon

9

--.----

Running

2

Helio Castroneves

3

0.7104

Running

3

Tony Kanaan

11

1.5022

Running

4

Ryan Briscoe

6

1.8872

Running

5

Danica Patrick

7

2.6502

Running

6

Marco Andretti

26

3.8013

Running

7

Graham Rahal

2

7.8233

Running

8

Hideki Mutoh

27

8.543

Running

9

Ed Carpenter

20

8.9871

Running

10

Dan Wheldon

4

9.7681

Running

11

Mario Moraes

5

20.9048

Running

12

Robert Doornbos

6

1 lap

Running

13

Sarah Fisher

67

6.9935

Running

14

Justin Wilson

18

7.0478

Running

15

Ryan Hunter-Reay

21

4 laps

Running

16

Milka Duno

23

5 laps

Running

17

Stanton Barrett

98

19 laps

Running

18

Dario Franchitti

10

49 laps

Contact

19

Mike Conway

24

91 laps

Mechanical

20

Raphael Matos

2

105 laps

Contact

21

EJ Viso

13

163 laps

Mechanical

22

Vitor Meira

14

186 laps

Contact

 

Championship Points

1

Tony Kanaan

100 pts

 

2

Ryan Briscoe

99 pts

-1

3

Dario Franchitti

96 pts

-4

4

Scott Dixon

81 pts

-19

5

Ryan Hunter-Reay

74 pts

-26