IRL IndyCar Series Round 11: Nashville Superspeedway, Nashville
Dixon Continues Nashville Hot Streak
When you’re hot, you’re hot. Scott Dixon and
his Target Chip Ganassi Racing team can apparently do no wrong
at the moment, in the IndyCar Series, as a late-race miscommunication
paid off in spades for driver and team when rain brought an
early end to Saturday night’s Firestone Indy 200 at
Nashville Superspeedway.
Dixon and teammate Dan Wheldon were running second and seventh,
respectively, when the yellow caution flag flew on Lap 138
as a sprinkle of rain rolled over the track. At the time,
Tony Kanaan held a 3.5-second lead over Dixon and appeared
headed for his second victory of the season.
Still under caution on Lap 140 and Kanaan led virtually the
entire field into pit lane for a final fuel and tire stop.
But the call from his team came too late for Dixon, who was
past the pit lane entry point and had to stay on track, with
Wheldon following suit.
The light rain quickly disappeared, and racing resumed on
Lap 152. It looked as if the Ganassi drivers would be forced
to pit under green flag conditions, when a much heavier rain
shower arrived on the scene on Lap 166, and the race was red-flagged
to a halt on Lap 171, 39 short of the scheduled 200-lap distance.
The rain preserved the win for Dixon, his third in a row here
at Nashville and a series-leading fourth this season, extending
his lead in the championship standings to 63 points after
12 of 18 races.
It was another typically successful weekend for Honda, engine
supplier for the full IndyCar Series, in the fourth of six
consecutive race weekends. A total of 24 Honda-powered drivers
ran 8,854 miles of practice, qualifying and racing this weekend
without a major failure. So far in 2008, IndyCar drivers have
run 161,125 miles with just one recorded failure – on
the Vision Racing car of Davey Hamilton during practice leading
up to the Indianapolis 500.
If Dixon was the big winner tonight, Kanaan was the biggest
loser. The Andretti Green Racing driver led a race-high 59
laps and appeared in control of the contest under green flag
conditions. But the shuffle during the final pit stops and
an opportunistic pass by Helio Castroneves to snatch third
on the restart dropped Kanaan to a fourth-place finish.
Vitor Meira was another to suffer at the hand of fate, as
a problem with fuel coupling in last stop dropped the Panther
Racing driver from a strong third to a disappointed sixth,
just behind Danica Patrick. Buddy Rice posted his second-consecutive
top-10 finish in seventh, followed by Vision Racing’s
Ed Carpenter. Darren Manning also posted a second top-10 result
for A.J. Foyt Racing in ninth. Rookie Mario Moraes followed
up his career-high seventh last week at Watkins Glen with
10th tonight.
Next week, the IndyCar Series heads back to road racing for
the July 20 Honda Indy 200 at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course
in Lexington, Ohio.
Scott Dixon(#9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing Honda)
Started 5th, finished 1st, 3rd consecutive Nashvile victory,
4th IndyCar win of 2008, 14th career win; 100th major race
victory for Chip Ganassi Racing:
“This is three guitars [the first place trophy is a
commemorative Gibson guitar]. Man, I’m pretty impressed.
Tonight I don’t think we had the best car but the luck
is going our way, and I feel for Tony [Kanaan]. We were fast
by ourselves, but ‘TK’ was definitely stronger
in traffic. On the last caution, it was actually a bit of
miscommunication. By the time they called me in [to pit],
I was already way past the pit entry. It wasn’t looking
pretty for us until the rains came back. It wasn’t pretty,
but we’ll take it.”
Tony Kanaan (#11 Andretti Green Racing Honda) Started
7th, finished 4th:
"I support my team 100 percent. It was the right call
to come in on lap 148, and a lot of people followed our lead
[into the pits]. Who can predict the rain? Unfortunately,
the rain and I don't get along too well. But we 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 had my share of the luck in 2004."
Roger Griffiths(Race Team Technical Leader, Honda
Performance Development) on tonight’s race:
“That’s four down and two to go in this string
of consecutive race weekends. It’s a shame for the fans
that the rain ended tonight’s race early, but it certainly
played to the advantage of Scott Dixon and Dan Wheldon. Congratulations
to Chip Ganassi, Mike Hull, and the entire Target Ganassi
organization on 100 race wins, the majority of them with Honda
power, I believe. They have built up one of the top teams
in motorsports over the years, and the results speak for themselves.”
IRL IndyCar Series
Round 11: Nashville Superspeedway, Nashville
1 Scott Dixon (Target Chip Ganassi)
2 Dan Wheldon (Target Chip Ganassi)
3 Helio Castroneves (Team Penske)
4 Tony Kanaan (Andretti Green Racing)
5 Danica Patrick (Andretti Green Racing)
6 Vitor Meira (Panther Racing)
7 Buddy Rice (Dreyer & Reinbold Racing
8 Ed Carpenter (Vision Racing)
9 Darren Manning (A.J. Foyt Racing)
10 Mario Moraes (Dale Coyne Racing)
11 Will Power (KV Racing Technologies)
12 Graham Rahal (Newman Haas Lanigan)
13 Marty Roth (Roth Racing)
14 Hideki Mutoh (Andretti Green Racing)
15 Bruno Junqueira (Dale Coyne Racing)
16 Oriol Servia (KV Racing Technologies)
17 Milka Duno (Dreyer & Reinbold Racing)
18 Justin Wilson (Newman Haas Lanigan)
19 Ryan Hunter-Reay (Rahal Letterman Racing)
20 Enrique Bernoldi (Conquest Racing)
21 Jaime Camara (Conquest Racing)
22 A.J. Foyt IV (Vision Racing)
23 Ryan Briscoe (Team Penske)
24 Marco Andretti (Andretti Green Racing)
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