The BulleTin • SaTurday, april 17, 2021 B3
MOTOR SPORTS | INDYCAR PREVIEW
Scott Dixon seeks milestone 7th championship
BY JENNA FRYER
AP Auto Racing Writer
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. —
Scott Dixon looks around the
IndyCar paddock and sees
drivers half his age acting like
A.J. Foyt even if they’ve never
crossed the finish line first.
They are young and brash
with the same swagger of “Su-
per Tex,” the winningest driver
in IndyCar history.
“Most of them rock up
these days feeling, you know,
it seems like they’ve won ev-
erything in the world already,
you know?” Dixon said Friday.
”You definitely see the chang-
ing of the guard, which is al-
ways interesting.”
The Iceman isn’t ready to
pass the torch anytime soon.
Dixon begins his 21st season
in IndyCar with Sunday’s sea-
son-opening race at Barber
Motorsports Park in pursuit of
Foyt’s all-time marks.
The six-time champion
needs just one more title to tie
Foyt’s record of seven and his
50 career victories trail only
Foyt (67) and Mario Andretti
(52) in the record books. Will
Power and Sébastien Bourdais
at 39 wins each are the only ac-
tive drivers even remotely in
Dixon’s class.
And yet those trophies and
numbers and his two decades
of dominance don’t drive
Dixon the way they once did.
Don’t get him wrong — he
loves to win. But losing sticks
with him a whole lot longer
than a victory celebration.
He led wire-to-wire last year
in winning his sixth title, but
those celebratory moments
were fleeting.
“It’s nice to have victories but
it’s not something I really dwell
on too much,” Dixon said.
“The hard part is always all the
things you remember the most
Track
Olympics
Continued from B1
Continued from B1
The hope is that there will
be similar events for Class 4A
spring sports.
If he does not get the chance
to compete against the state’s
best for a second state title,
there is a new goal that Ander-
son is chasing. He is running
toward the number 49. A suc-
cessful senior season to him
ends with a time under 50 sec-
onds.
Anderson is close and be-
lieves he will break it this year.
His personal record is 50.04.
“It takes more grinding and
putting in enough work,” An-
derson said. “I really believe I
can put in that time.”
Crook County ended up
winning the Ice Breaker Thurs-
day. On the girls side, Crook
County finished with 282
points to win over Sisters (111),
La Pine (59) and Culver (34).
For the boys, Crook County
recorded 194.5 points to finish
ahead of La Pine (137), Sisters
Ryan Brennecke/The Bulletin
Sisters’ Brody Anderson nears the
finish line ahead of his competi-
tors while running in the 400-me-
ter dash Thursday in Prineville.
(95.5) and Culver (65).
“It felt really good to be
back out on the track and have
kids competing,” said Crook
County coach Ernie Brooks.
“Great weather and great com-
petition. It was great to be back
out there together again.”
e e
noted that Álex Palou, the
24-year-old second-year Indy-
Car driver, was the fastest of
the four Ganassi drivers in pre-
season testing and might very
well be the one Dixon has to
beat this year.
Dixon thinks he is up for the
challenge and finds that much
like Tampa Bay quarterback
Tom Brady, who at 43 won
his sixth Super Bowl in Feb-
ruary, he’s in the best physical
shape of his life. His cardio and
strength training has evolved
over the last decade, and he
said he doesn’t have a great
gauge on his reaction speeds
“because I still pass my tests, so
that’s a good thing.”
His biggest challenge, he’s
found, has been time manage-
ment since he and wife, Emma,
decided to expand their family
last year. They welcomed a third
child — their only son — a de-
cade after starting their family.
of the close misses. I think
that’s the part of what drives
you. I don’t go to bed thinking
about how great it was to win
a sixth championship. But I do
go to bed thinking about how
close we lost the Indy 500 last
year. That’s what keeps the fire
strong.”
Dixon is now in pursuit of
motorsports’ magical num-
ber: Michael Schumacher
and Lewis Hamilton both
won seven Formula One ti-
tles, while Richard Petty, Dale
Earnhardt and Jimmie Johnson
each won seven in NASCAR.
Foyt is alone in IndyCar.
But time is not on Dixon’s
side.
He turns 41 in July and al-
though he has won two of the
last three championships, he
has never won back-to-back
titles and guesses he has five
good years left in his career.
Team owner Chip Ganassi
Reporter: 541-383-0307,
brathbone@bendbulletin.com
“They typically come to at
least one of our sessions at the
Olympics,” Ledecky said rue-
fully. “I know this year it prob-
ably won’t be able to happen.”
With coronavirus cases
surging in Japan, the prospect
of canceling an Olympics that
already has been pushed back
a year was raised again this
week by a leading politician.
Toshihiro Nikai, the No. 2
person in the ruling political
party, was asked during an in-
terview if cancellation was still
an option.
“Of course,” he replied, add-
ing that if the Tokyo Games
piled on to the misery already
wreaked by COVID-19 “there
would be no meaning to hav-
ing the Olympics.”
But the swiftness with
which Nikai backtracked and
a bunch of other powerful offi-
cials jumped in to say his com-
ments were off the mark only
solidified the reality that these
Mike Carlson/AP file
Driver Scott Dixon, left, and team owner Chip Ganassi celebrate after
winning the NTT IndyCar Series Championship following a race in St.
Petersburg, Florida, in October.
Kit Dixon has been an
eye-opening adjustment after
two daughters because every
crash, bang and fall creates a
momentary panic only for the
toddler to bounce back up and
get back on his way.
“He definitely loves adven-
ture and has a pretty high pain
tolerance,” Dixon said.
“It’s very different from the
girls.”
games are going forward — no
matter what happens in the
next three months.
“There are a variety of con-
cerns but as the Tokyo 2020
organizing committee we
are not thinking about can-
celing the games,” said Seiko
Hashimoto, who heads up the
Tokyo organizing committee.
But Hashimoto acknowl-
edged that Nikai has a right to
be concerned, and that sort of
thinking is right in line with a
Japanese public that has polled
as high as 80% against holding
the Olympics during the pan-
demic.
“His comment has re-
minded us of how tedious it
was for us to feel confident or
be fully prepared for delivering
the games,” Hashimoto said.
Though there will surely be
socially distanced fans in the
stands — Japan has allowed
people to attend sporting
events since last summer —
these Olympics will essentially
be a made-for-TV event.
Everyone from the athletes
This weekend will be the
first race for father and son, a
moment Dixon can’t wait to
share with his little boy.
“I took him to a go-kart race
once and his eyes were pop-
ping out of his head, so I’m re-
ally looking forward to taking
him out and showing him cars
on the track,” Dixon said. “I
think this is going to be a very
fun year for our family.”
and coaches to officials and
the media will be on virtual
lockdown during their time in
Japan, restricted largely to the
stadiums and arenas where the
events are held and the rooms
where they will lay their heads
at night.
That is good enough for
the International Olympic
Committee, which relies on
international broadcast fees
for nearly three-fourths of its
revenue. Besides, TV is the
conduit through which nearly
everyone except a lucky few
gets to experience the games,
so a cancellation would leave a
giant void in the summer pro-
gramming schedule.
Frankly, it’s understandable
that Japanese officials want
to press forward, considering
how much the country has laid
out to prepare for the world’s
grandest boondoggle — at
least $15 billion officially, with
audits suggesting the actual
figure might be twice as much.
And, of course, the athletes
desperately want to compete,
no matter what restrictions are
are placed on them. This is a
moment that usually comes
around only once every four
years, and they’ve already had
to tack on an extra year of
training, preparation and ex-
pense just to take part in the
Tokyo Games.
When a British newspaper
suggested in January that the
Olympics might be canceled,
U.S. gymnastics star Sim-
one Biles likely expressed the
mindset of her fellow athletes.
“I’ll basically do anything at
this moment,” Biles told NBC.
“Whatever they say they want
us to do, I’m in 100%, because
I’ve been training so hard, and
I’ve just been so ready.”
Sadly, no matter how the
IOC tries to spin it, everyone
in the Pandemic Games will
be walking on eggshells until
the flame is extinguished on
Aug, 8.
Only then can the celebra-
tion really begin.
Or, more likely, nothing
more than a giant sigh of relief.
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