Ron's letter from America 2nd April 09*
The Indycar season starts this weekend
This weekend is shaping up and looking good. Scott (Dixon) is more focused than ever and he is definitely not resting on his laurels. I don’t know what it is but it is there. He still has a lot he wants to do, particularly he would like to do the double again (Indy 500 and IRL championship). He is super-determined to make it work.
In my opinion Ryan Briscoe could be Scott’s biggest threat this year. They seem to be a cut above the rest in testing. However it’s hard to tell with some of the drivers. No doubt we'll know more on Saturday after qualifying.
What's amazing is that the Indy Lights (the feeder series to the Indycar Series) will have up to twenty-eight cars while Indycars while have about twenty-two this season. I would have thought that there would have been only about eighteen Indy Lights.
We’re involved in a two-car team running Jay Howard and Charlie Kimble, Team PBIR (Palm Beach International Raceway). I’ll fill you in more as we go as I'll be at every meeting this season. It’s great that we are living in Florida, only four hours drive from St Petersburg where the first round is being run.
Currently I am the running (actually the President of) the Palm Beach International Raceway. It’s a huge complex with a drag strip, road course and kart track. What’s more we can run all three at the same time and day and night, all year round. I’ll talk about it more over the season but take a look at our website www.racepbir.com .
Tonight we have the Palm Beach Car Club on the road course. They’ll have about 20-30 cars including Lamborghini’s and Ferrari’s.
It is also ‘arrive and drive’ at the drag strip. There will be about 100 cars. As well we have about 20-30 karters most nights.
More soon, I’ll try and write after qualifying on Saturday (local time).
*Ron Dixon is father to Indianapolis 500 winner and 2003 & 08 IndyCar champion Scott Dixon. He is also the President of Palm Beach International Raceway, Junpitor, Florida. This season nzracer.com follows Ron on his road trip around America with the Indycar Championship. Each week Ron will give us the insiders view from track side, pit lane and behind the scenes.
