Photo Credit: Ashley McCubbin
Scott Dixon, driver of the No. 9 Target Chevrolet, finished the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach in second place after starting the race second. He battled his way to the lead and worked hard to keep it, but in the end came up short.
“Yeah, it was definitely a pretty fierce battle up front, a bit of lapped traffic, some pit stop sequence, people trying to pit short, go longer, et cetera, et cetera, so it was quite exciting, I think, for ins and outs and when to use, your overtakes and things like that.,” Dixon said. “I think on the last one we got caught off guard a little bit before the pit sequence had already been finished, and then to hear when we’re coming down the straight that the 22 (Simon Pagenaud) was just coming out, we had actually backed off already and started saving fuel. With the gap that we had on Helio (Castroneves), I really didn’t think we had to worry about too much and didn’t get any warning from the pits.
“Obviously that scenario was a lot closer than we anticipated, and then when we got to Turn 1, it appeared that Simon turned a little early and crossed the line that you’re not meant to cross. But it is what it is, so second place today, and Team Target did a hell of a job, and pit stops were clean, and I think we had really good pace, but personally.”
During the race there was a lot of controversy of drivers crossing the yellow line sooner than they should coming out of the pits for position advantage. According to Dixon, during the drivers meeting prior to the race, it was made pretty clear what would happen if they didn’t obey but the rules.
“This one is always very clear and is always mentioned, and we have two drivers’ meetings a weekend, and it was clearly stated,” Dixon said. “I think if you look at the PDF, it’s even in the PDF view that everybody gets, and I believe in the first one on Friday, it was asked several times about that. By all means any time you could not put more than two wheels over the line, and that was my understanding. I thought we were done with warnings and all this sort of wish wash stuff and we’re going to stick to hard rules, but obviously that wasn’t the case today.”
About more that halfway through the race Dixie was leading, when Simon Pagenaud driver of the No. 22 PPF Chevrolet came off pit road, cutting the line sooner than he should and got the lead. Dixon never could get the lead back.
During the offseason IndyCar amended the rules in the rule book, including one about entering and exiting pit road. According to Dixon, they also stated that no warnings would be issued anymore, but rather penalties for each case. IndyCar stated post-race that warnings are still going to be used in some cases, and said the ‘no warnings amendment’ pertained to blocking and aggressive driver, only.
“In defense of that, I thought we had outlawed warnings,” Dixon said. “Yes, a warning was clarified at some point, but this was the problem we had in the offseason with people getting warnings all the time, especially when you’re using it to your advantage when it’s the last pit stop sequence or anything like that. If you’re just going to get a warning every time you’re going to do it, that’s why this was discussed so deeply in the off-season, and why there was about 40 or 50 warning zones in the rule book removed. Obviously a few topics of conversation after this weekend. I don’t even know why we discussed the pit lane exit if we’re not going to stick to rules. Everybody else abided by it.”
After the pit road incident, when Dixie thought that Pagenaud was going to be penalized, he was driving angry.
“You know, there’s moments where you kind of try to get a little more of a gap just to cool things off around these places, especially like Long Beach when you’re trimmed out a little bit and you’re racing really close,” Dixon said. “I think we had a pretty tight gap on the 22. You can overheat the tires and brakes and stuff, so you go through highs and lows of when to attack and when not to. Obviously 15 laps from the end, I was pretty angry, but even a little bit earlier — but it doesn’t really affect, I think, what you’re trying to do. You can only do as much as you can with the car at that point.”
In contrast, Dixon is usually calm, cool and collected and it takes a lot to make him mad. But when he gets mad , boy does he show it.
“Well, I was pretty mad once I got out of the car even with the last sort of 15 laps waiting for a drive-through or at least a swap of positions,” Dixon said. “I was even a little mad at Simon after the race, but it’s not his fault. You’ve got to try to take advantage whenever you can, but he doesn’t make the rules or put the rules forward. Huge credit obviously to Simon. He raced a fantastic race, and it was a great win for him and the team. You know, I can’t be mad at him, so I’ll direct my anger some other direction.”
Despite everything that happened in the race today, Dixon sits second in the points behind Pagenaud. He has had an incredible season thus far with a seventh, a win and a second place. He is doing better than years passed where he started the season off poorly, but came on strong in the end. The last time he started a season off this good was 2008, in which he won the championship.
“Yeah, you know, it’s definitely a positive start, but a win is a win.” Dixon said “When it’s in scenarios like this that you shouldn’t be really fighting over how things are called, and victories are so tough to come by these days, you know, you want to — when your car is good and you do have a good race and reliability is good, you definitely want to strike while the iron is hot. So yeah, absolutely a positive start so far three races in. It’s still very early, but the competition is very, very tight, as well, and obviously with Simon winning today, that stretched his points lead a little bit over us. But yeah, as you said, it is a positive start for Team Target.”
