Dixon notches 57th win of Indycar career

WELLINGTON: New ZealanderScott Dixon has shown he remains a contender in Indycars after winning the latest round in California.

Dixon won the Grand Prix of Long Beach yesterday, the 57th victory of his career.

He is now just 10 wins behind American great AJ Foyt.

Dixon made his second pit stop earlier than the rest of the contenders and went into fuelsaving mode late in the race. The 43yearold held on to beat Colton Herta and teammate Alex Palou.

After the race he paid tribute to late New Zealand motorsport benefactor Sir Colin Giltrap who was key to Dixon’s progress early on in his career.

‘‘This win I am going to dedicate to Sir Colin Giltrap. He obviously helped start my career. We lost him this week so a huge thankyou to him and all the support back home.’’

Dixon rates the win as one of his toughest given the fuelsaving strategy.

‘‘It’s way up there . . . the stress level was high. Those guys were coming fast and strong and we were off by a lap or two from making it easy.

‘‘Other fuel [strategy] races I have done we’ve been under control for the whole stint but . . . last two laps the team came on and said ‘Go for it. We have got plenty of fuel’ and away we went.

‘‘We made it back to pits so we had loads left,’’ Dixon said.

It is the second time Dixon has won the Long Beach event, following up from his success in 2015.

Dixon is second in the Indycar standings after two rounds, 12 points behind Joseph Newgarden, who finished fourth yesterday. The victory means Dixon has extended his record streak of consecutive seasons with at least one victory to 20.

Marcus Armstrong was 12th yesterday while fellow New Zealander Scott McLaughlin failed to finish.