Dixon spoils Penske party with win at Road America

Scott Dixon won the IndyCar race at Road America on Sunday in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, to spoil the Team Penske party on the rural road course.

Dixon edged Josef Newgarden by 0.57 seconds to claim his first victory at Road America. It also gave the Chip Ganassi Racing veteran his first win since Watkins Glen in September.

Dixon’s 41st career victory moved him within one of tying Michael Andretti for third on the all-time list.

Ganassi has a chance for a weekend sweep. Kyle Larson, the NASCAR points leader, started on the pole at Sonoma in a Ganassi car.

In IndyCar’s second year back at the 14-turn course after a nine-year hiatus, Dixon’s No. 9 Honda had an average speed of 123.431 mph. He held off Newgarden and the three other Penske drivers who started up front.

Newgarden’s teammate Helio Castroneves, the pole sitter, finished third. They were followed by Simon Pagenaud and Will Power.

The Chevrolet-powered Penske team was the talk of the track all weekend after dominating through practice and qualifying.

Dixon took the victory lap, finishing off a day that started with fuel pressure issues during warmups.

“Yeah we didn’t even know if it was going to run,” Dixon said. “On the warmup lap, we were just trying to see if the car was going to run.”

He was thankful for the work of his crew, which he said had to replace the fuel cell, among other last-minute fixes.

The hard work paid off after a late caution. Dixon held off Newgarden on the restart with eight laps to go in the 55lap race.

“Toward the end I thought it was a straight up battle, I thought it was going to be tough,” Dixon said. “I knew once it kind of plateaued after five or four laps, we were going to be OK.”

Azerbaijan GP

Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo profited from the chaos to win the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, while Sebastian Vettel extended his championship lead over Lewis Hamilton.

The Australian secured his fifth career win, while Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas overtook 18-year-old Canadian Lance Stroll’s Williams in the closing meters to take second place.

“It was just a crazy race, with all the safety cars and the chaos,” Ricciardo said. “On the cooldown lap, I was just giggling like a schoolboy.”

Vettel steered his Ferrari into fourth, just ahead of Hamilton’s Mercedes.

After eight races, Vettel leads Hamilton by 14 points.

In a stop-start race, the safety car came out three times in quick succession before a red flag stopped the grand prix near the midway point because debris littered the track.

Shortly before that, Hamilton and Vettel were involved in an incident that threatens to sour their good relations.

Hamilton appeared to stop his car right in front of Vettel, causing Vettel to collide into him. An irate Vettel then accelerated alongside Hamilton and appeared to deliberately swerve back into him.

Vettel was given a 10-second stop-go penalty, but Hamilton lost valuable time changing a loose headrest at the same time that Vettel served his time penalty.

Hamilton was on Vettel’s tail on the last lap, but could not overtake.

The fact Ricciardo won from 10th on the grid, and that Bottas clawed his way back from last following an early incident, summed up a bizarre race.