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…
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