Scott Dixon takes fifth win of 2008 at Edmonton (Indy Car)

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Scott Dixon won once again in the Indy Racing League thanks to rapid pit work by his Ganassi pit crew and a slice of fortunate with the race distance.

Dixon had a quiet race until the late stages when one of his Penske rivals was knocked into a spin and the other fell back in the pits.

Ryan Briscoe led the opening laps but soon had to give best to team mate Helio Castroneves. Briscoe’s race was ruined when Ed Carpenter nudged him into a spin – Carpenter in turned being squeezed by Dan Wheldon. After falling to 17th Briscoe dived into the pits to take on enough fuel to reach the end of the race.

Justin Wilson seemed to come around with the front wing of his car less than a fifth of a second behind the rear of someone else’s, but around the fast sweeps of Edmonton he struggled to find somewhere to make a pass.

However he managed to make a move on Paul Tracy in the dying stages for what would become third, with Oriol Servia also passing Tracy late in the race. Nonetheless it was a very successful return for the Canadian who scored an excellent fifth from 16th on the grid.

The Andretti-Green team seemed to self-destruct, however. First Hideki Mutoh crashed out. Then there were reports of Marco Andretti and Danice Patrick refusing to let Tony Kanaan pass them even though the Brazilian was on a different fuel strategy. Then Andretti knocked Patrick out of the race.

After a series of caution periods the race duration was changed from being a lapped race to a timed race. That switch played into the leaders’ hands beautfully as it meant they no longer had to make an extra stop for fuel and Briscoe’s advantage was nixed. However he managed to pass enough cars to finished sixth at the end.

That left Dixon to lead Castroneves home after the Brazilian ran wide while chasing the Ganassi driver.

Championship standings – top 8

Scott Dixon 505
Helio Castroneves 440
Dan Wheldon 390
Tony Kanaan 389
Ryan Briscoe 324
Danica Patrick 296
Hideki Mutoh 286
Oriol Servia 282

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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