Dixon Scores Improbable Victory in Wild Race at Nashville

Last year's inaugural race in Nashville featured nine cautions, two red flags, and a flying Chip Ganassi car finding victory lane. Not to be out-done, today's race was even crazier. There was another red flag, multiple incidents, frustrated drivers, and even a lightning storm for good measure. The end result was the same - a Ganassi car celebrating the race win.

Dixon's victory today was an improbable one, even by Dixon standards. The veteran driver started back in 14th after another poor qualifying effort. Early in the race, Dixon was involved in a massive pile up that took out multiple cars, and involved several championship contenders. The back of the No. 9 Honda was beat up, and had to come to pit road multiple times for repairs. Then, in typical Dixon fashion, it happened.

The big break that the team needed came on Lap 52 when Rinus VeeKay got stuck behind the crashed car of Graham Rahal. The caution came out, which was a stroke of luck to Dixon and others who had just pitted. That vaulted him to the front of the field, and the six-time champion was able to capitalize.

"Man, Nashville is so awesome," Dixon said. "I was real worried about McLaughlin because I knew he'd take a chance. He kind of has to with the standings at the moment, and he was super-fast on fresher tires, so I was a sitting duck. A lap or two more would've been really tough to do."

"Kudos to the team. We had a big crash there that took half the floor off, so we had to take four turns of front wing out, we had no grip. And then I think we did 45-50 laps on that last set of tires, so the last stop we didn't even take tires."

Today's victory moves Dixon into sole possession of 2nd place on the All-Time Wins list, breaking the tie with Mario Andretti. The win also catapulted him from 4th to 2nd in the championship standings. Dixon trails Will Power by just six points with three races remaining.

It was almost a photo finish as Scott McLaughlin nearly won a drag race to the finish line. The Team Penske driver was strong all weekend, but the pole sitter needed just one more lap to make his move. While he was disappointed to not come away with the win, it was a solid weekend for McLaughlin, who was the only Chevrolet driver to finish inside of the top-five.

"We were side-by-side across the finish line," McLaughlin said. "One more lap! We were 15th on that last pit exchange, just had an awesome restart and the car was fast, it was unreal. Just fell short at the end but congrats to Scotty. I always dreamed about racing him until the end. I had a lot of fun and that's why I've come to IndyCar racing. This is the best racing in the world. Great weekend, great for the points and we'll just keep pushing in the last three races of the year."

McLaughlin found himself in a Ganassi sandwich as Alex Palou scored his fifth podium of the season. The reigning series champion led laps and was in position for a victory, but a mistake while passing Power broke a piece of his front wing, which ultimately took him out of contention for the win. “Every day you’re on the podium is a good day,” Palou said. “Got some points back for the championship.”

Keeping with the wild and crazy theme of the day, Andretti Autosport drivers Alexander Rossi and Colton Herta rebounded to score top-five finishes today. Both drivers had trouble early in the race as Herta tapped the wall and went a lap down to the leader. Rossi had a mechanical issue that killed his engine for a few moments, then got taken out by Callum Ilott when the Juncos Hollinger Racing driver suffered a cut right-rear tire.

“This place is pretty wild,” Rossi said. “I think that’s as good as a win. Huge thank you to the team for hanging in there.” His teammate agreed with that assessment. “I’m happy with how we came back, not only from starting at the back, but also being a lap down at some point that doesn’t happen too often,” said Herta.

Josef Newgarden was unable to win at his home race track, but the Nashville native had a solid 6th place finish after leading laps. He was not able to gain ground in the championship standings, but the Penske ace still has a crack at his third title with three races remaining in the season.

This weekend was shaping up to be a special one for Christian Lundgaard. The rookie finished runner-up last weekend at Indianapolis, and was the fastest driver in Friday's practice session. Lundgaard qualified 3rd and battled up front all day, but lost a number of positions during the final restart.

It was a good day for Lundgaard and his Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing teammate Jack Harvey, who both finished inside the top-ten. The 9th place result for Harvey was his best finish of the season, but Graham did not have the same luck today. The second-generation driver was involved in the early chain-reaction crash, and suffered a significant amount of damage to the front of his Honda.

Rahal slammed hard into the back of Pato O'Ward, and appeared to be done after multiple pit stops to try and repair his car. He made it back out on the track later in the race, only to find the wall once again.

O'Ward was not so fortunate in this incident. The damage to the rear end of his car was terminal, as the Arrow McLaren SP driver was unable to get the car into gear. The damaged gearbox and DNF result likely takes O'Ward out of the championship battle.

"The No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet was strong all weekend," O'Ward said. "Unfortunately, we didn't have much luck in the race. I saw a car slowing down so I just had to get on the brakes. What Graham did to me, I was going to do to Will. Sadly, there's only one way to look at it and it was a big enough hit to break something in the gearbox. I just couldn't get it into any gear. Unfortunately, that's our day."

Two rookies were quite impressive today, as Kyle Kirkwood and David Malukas were both running inside the top five for much of the afternoon. The two young drivers got together in Turn 9 with just 15 laps remaining though, and the end result was both cars in the tire barriers. A promising finish for each driver (and their small teams) went out the window in the blink of an eye.

Another tense moment came with 5 laps to go as Newgarden tried to make a move around Romain Grosjean. The two touched wheels, which put the Andretti driver into the concrete barrier. It was just another chapter in the disappointing season for Grosjean, who started today's race on the front row.

Newgarden's message to Grosjean was clear: "Welcome to IndyCar, it gets tight," he said. "The big thing was that I was ahead at that kind of moment. It's tight street course racing and I almost got taken out six times myself. Ultimately we had a big fight back with the PPG car, that's all I can say."

Despite Dixon winning and his 11th place finish, Power still holds the lead in the championship. "When you get hit from behind, it knocks out your shifting so you have to manually shift. You have to lift on upshifts and you have to blip the throttle. That makes it an interesting day. I sat back and watched so much mayhem today. We thought this would be a bit of a wildcard race, so you just needed to survive. We’re still in a great place and still digging deep. We’ll see what we can do in the last three races.”

After a grueling stretch of five races in four weeks, the series will now have an off-weekend to recharge their batteries. Only three races remain until a champion is crowned for the 2022 season. The next event comes at World Wide Technology Raceway, which is the final oval race on the calendar. Coverage for Saturday's Bommarito Automotive Group 500 begins at 6 ET on USA Network.