It’s rare to find an accomplishment that Scott Dixon hasn’t achieved during his storied NTT IndyCar Series career.
However, Sunday uncovered a new item that Dixon can add — racing without radio communication with his crew for an entire race.
As bizarre and unheard of that is in a time where technology continues to reach new heights, the six-time champion was on his own during the majority of the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, IndyCar’s opening round.
“No radio for the entire race,” Dixon affirmed. “It was kind of tough just to see what we were doing, kind of mileage-wise. I knew it was going to be a lot tighter, obviously; once the first caution happened, it was going to be a strict kind of two-stopper.”
Known as “The Iceman,” Dixon again lived up to his nickname with a cool and collected drive that saw him finish runner-up to teammate and winner, Alex Palou. According to Dixon, radio communication “kind of worked on the warm-up laps and kind of for the first 10 and that was about it.”
He believes the issue is what cost he and his Chip Ganassi Racing team a victory, which would’ve been the 59th of his career.
“We caught that traffic with about five or six cars and lost about two or three seconds on that in lap, so that was a bit of a nightmare,” Dixon explained of his final pit stop.
“Yeah, I don’t know. Car was good. I think pit stops were really good. I think all around, we had good speed. I think anytime that we had clean air, we could definitely stretch out, but spent most of the race in dirty air.
“It’s kind of the first time I’ve ever done a whole race without a radio, so that was interesting. Glad we got some good points and a nice one-two for the team.”
Without communication with his No. 9 team, how was Dixon able to know when to stop for service?
He relied on his fuel light.
“You have a fuel light so you can run — you know when the car is going to run out,” Dixon explained. “I didn’t know if they could hear me, so I was just telling them I’m just go to run to the light and see what happens.
“Ultimately I think for me, it was just one lap too long. I should have pitted maybe when I saw the 10 (Palou) car coming in.”
While it may not have been a victory, race’s like Sunday is another moment in Dixon’s career that simply placed him a cut above the rest.
