NUTS AND BOLTS
What: The Kohler Grand Prix, the 10th of 17 races on the Verizon IndyCar Series schedule.
When: Thursday through Sunday.
Where:Road America, a 4.048-mile, 14-turn natural terrain road course in Elkhart Lake.
Tickets: $30 Thursday (support series); $40 Friday (IndyCar practice, support series); $70 Saturday (IndyCar practice and qualifying, support series); $80 Sunday (IndyCar race, support series); $170 weekend. Children 16 and under free with paying adult.
Broadcasts: TV - NBC Sports Network; Radio - AM-920.
Last year: Scott Dixon broke up an anticipated Penske party to pick up his first victory of the season and first at a track with which he’d fallen in love more than 15 years earlier. Dixon beat Josef Newgarden on a mid-race restart and held him off on another. The Team Penske drivers, who were 1-4 in practice and qualifying, finished 2-5 in the race.
Season to date: Dixon, who hadn’t led a lap through May, has won two of the past three races to surge to the top of the standings. Dixon took the first round in Detroit and then Texas. With 357 points, Dixon is 23 ahead of Alexander Rossi and 36 in front of Indianapolis 500 winner Will Power.
Support series: Pirelli World Challenge, Indy Lights, USF2000, Pro Mazda, Global MX-5 Cup.
IndyCar schedule: Friday – 11 a.m. practice, 1:15 p.m. autograph session, 3:15 p.m. practice. Saturday – 11 a.m. practice, 3 p.m. qualifying. Sunday – 11:30 a.m. driver introductions, 12:05 p.m. race (55 laps).
FIVE DRIVERS TO WATCH
Scott Dixon: After a relatively quiet start to the season, the 37-year-old four-time champion won twice in the course of eight days to move to third on the all-time list behind A.J. Foyt and Mario Andretti. In four starts in CART and IndyCar at Road America, Dixon has won once, finished fourth once, dropped out with mechanical problems twice and never qualified worse than fifth.
Josef Newgarden: In addition to a runner-up finish last year with Team Penske, he placed eighth for Ed Carpenter Racing in 2017 just two weeks into recovery for fractures in his right collarbone and hand. The defending series champion has two victories, including at Barber Motorsports Park, another traditional road course.
Will Power: The 2016 Road America winner swept Indianapolis (the Grand Prix and 500), has another pair of second-place finishes and has started on the front two rows for all but one race this season.
Simon Pagenaud: With Power and Newgarden, the 2016 series champion gives Team Penske another shot at the podium sweep it narrowly missed last June. He finished fourth then and was running second to Power in ’16 before his engine soured.
Ryan Hunter-Reay: This track has been tough on Andretti Autosport, but with a finish of fourth at Road America in 2016, Hunter-Reay has been the leader of the pack. He broke a 42-race drought this month at Detroit. With two runner-up finishes and three fifths, he sits fourth in the standings.