Dixon happy in Indy after “pretty awful”

Dixon is fifth in the championship after the first five rounds of the season and only 34 points from the lead, but has not yet finished above fifth in the race.

He had to come back from a lap down after running out of fuel at the Indianapolis Grand Prix last weekend to finish the worst tenth place of the season, while teammate and reigning champion Alex Palu is second in points after three podium finishes .

Reflecting on his season to date, Dixon said: “I think in some circumstances it was pretty awful.

“Honestly, there were some pretty big mistakes we made as a band that should never have happened. These are probably two.

“And then, I think we got into some weird snowball effect here on the road [last weekend]. Honestly, we’ve just changed too many things, and if you do that, you’re just losing your balance, and given how fierce the competition is now, you’re going to have dinner – and we definitely were.

“I think the race cars are very good. We had a very strong race if you look at the competition on the field. It really was a qualification when we were either wrong or in trouble. “

But the 2008 Indie winner on Tuesday in second practice on the Indianapolis oval track at the Indianapolis racetrack took second gear and was the fastest in the morning session as all four of his teammates finished the day in the top 10.

Four-time Indy 500 winner Paul Dixon said the solution to his plight would be to “reboot, calm down and get back to it,” and explained that he enjoyed the opening day of the run at IMS.

Reflecting on his day, Kiwi said: “We’ve always had more things to check out than actually get in the car and run it, but the good thing is that the five strong cars we were able to get through it pretty quickly.

Some “feel like drivers,” so you want to test them yourself to make sure it’s the way you’d like it.

“I think in a week we’ll sort this out, and I think for all of us it’s actually about working on the road, as we’ve seen most people do today.

Last year it was interesting to see when people switched to quality finishes – as on Thursday we had a lot, which was amazing, so we’ll keep an eye on that.

“The car feels strong, but there is always room for improvement.”

He later added: “It’s nice to switch gears here on the speedway, and I expect it to continue if we get out of here, too.”