Best Ever? Mario Andretti Puts Six-Time IndyCar Champ Scott Dixon in the Discussion

From Autoweek

• Scott Dixon finished third on Sunday to hold off race-winner Josef Newgarden by 16 points for the NTT IndyCar Series championship.

• Dixon's title was his sixth in Indy cars, one short of A.J. Foyt's all-time record.

• Dixon was the first driver 40 years old or older to win the IndyCar championship since Nigel Mansell in 1993.

Does Scott Dixon belong in the same discussion for "best ever" as guys like Mario Andretti and A.J. Foyt?

Yes, says Mario.

Sunday afternoon, in a strange, crash-filled race on a super-slick street course at the St. Petersburg Grand Prix, Scott Ronald Dixon won his sixth—his sixth!—IndyCar title, pulling him two past Mario Andretti and to within one of A.J. Foyt. And at 40, Dixon has time to win a seventh.

Dixon, by finishing third, did what he had to do to take the championship back from Josef Newgarden, who, by winning the race, did all he could do to catch Dixon, but he came up a bit short. Dixon, for the first time, lead for this entire oddball, COVID-infected season, and his lead diminished as the race went on, but was good enough by a scant 16 points.

So Dixon moved closer to A.J. Foyt in championships; he has won 50 races, third overall to Mario Andretti (52) and Foyt (67). He has proven his versatility by winning the Rolex 24 at Daytona three times, including this year, and he won the Indianapolis 500, but “versatility” has a different meaning than it did in Foyt and Andretti’s era—where versatility meant winning F1 races, Daytona 500s, USAC sprint car races and, in Andretti’s case, the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb.

So should we really start to think about Scott Dixon the way we think about A.J. Foyt and Mario Andretti?

“Absolutely,” Andretti told Autoweek on Sunday.

“You look at his record of championships and wins, and we are absolutely in good company. I love the guy, I love what he stands for. He’s definitely one of the best ever.”

One major difference between then and now, Andretti said, is reliability.