MOTORSPORT: Dixon rules in the States - Chevrolet doesn't

Australian-born New Zealander Scott Dixon won the Road America round of the 2017 IndyCar series this morning (Australian time) to maintain his streak of winning at least one championship round every year for 13 consecutive years.

Dixon’s success at the Elkart Lake road course, in rural Wisconson, came in the tenth round of this year’ series.

The 37 year-old is a four-time Indycar champion and has indicated a drive at the Bathurst 1000 Supercar enduro would look good on his resume.

His 41 IndyCar race victories mean he is now just one race win away from joining Michael Andretti as the third most successful driver in the history of the iconic North American open-wheeler series.

Prior to the race start, the Road America event seemed destined to be a Penske-Chevrolet walkover after Roger Penske’s four drivers – including Toowoomba’s Will Power – dominated practice and qualifying.

But, putting aside fuel pressure problems in the warm-up, Dixon seized the lead around half-distance in his Honda-powered Ganassi entry to finish ahead of the Penske foursome – American Josef Newgarden, Brazilian Helio Castroneves, Frenchman Simon Pagenaud and Power.

That made Dixon the eighth different winner in 10 races so far this year (Formula 1 has had four winners in eight races) and the Kiwi stretched his points table lead over defending champion Pagenaud to 34 points – 379 to 345.

Power is the only two-time winner this year but, after a poor start, is sixth in the standings on 316 points. Castroneves has 342, Japan’s Indianapolis 500 winner Takuma Sato has 323 and Newgarden 318.

Chevrolet also lowered its colours this morning in the NASCAR round at California’s Sonoma Raceway, another road course.
Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer were first and second for Stewart-Haas Racing, a team which switched from Chevrolets to Fords this season. Penske driver Brad Keselowski made it a clean sweep for the Blue Oval with third place in his Miller Lite Ford Fusion.

Harvick’s victory was Ford’s seventh this year in NASCAR’s Monster Cup. Four teams have won for Ford in NASCAR this season.

Nevertheless, some potential good news for the GM brand was circulating the pits at the IndyCar race in Wisconsin, with speculation the Andretti Autosport team will ditch Honda engines at the end of this year and revert to Chevrolet powerplants.

Dumas king of Pikes Peak again
Frenchman Romain Dumas won his second consecutive Pikes Peak International Hill Climb this morning (Australian time).

Dumas made the 19.988-kilometre (12.42-mile) ‘Race to the Clouds’ climb in Colorado, North America in 9:05.672.

It was the Frenchman’s third Pikes Peak victory in the last four years and, this year, his Norma MXX RD Limited prototype vehicle featured an aggressive new aerodynamic package and a new turbocharged for the 2.0-litre Honda engine.

“Frustrating due to engine cut-offs early on my run,” Dumas said of his time which was well outside the record mark of 8:13.878 set by French rally great Sebastein Loeb in 2013 behind the wheel of a prototype car badged as a Peugeot.

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Second this year was a Pikes Peak ‘rookie’ six days short of his 55th birthday, Peter Cunningham, in a Honda Acura TLX GT.

Second generation New Zealand racer Rhys Millen won his class (Time Attack 1).

Weather which included fog and hail forced Pikes Peak organisers to cut runs in half for the last five competitors.

Apart from his success at Pikes Peak, Dumas has won the 24 Hours of Le Mans outright twice – with Audi in 2010 and Porsche last year.