The chequered flag had barely fallen on Helio Castroneves' first victory for 30 races at Infineon Raceway when rival team owner Chip Ganassi started doing sums in his head, as the Brazilian took a huge bite out of his man Scott Dixon's championship lead.
Castroneves dominated in Sonoma, while Dixon had a very rare off day that saw him fall to twelfth by the end of the 80-lap encounter, allowing his only rival for the crown to turn a 78-point deficit into one of just 43 points. While the Kiwi's revised advantage is slightly above the average margin with two races to go, he and Ganassi know that nothing is impossible - especially where Castroneves is concerned. Between 2001-07, the points leader has averaged a 35.1-point lead over his nearest competitor but, on three occasions, he was overhauled.
“I think, if Helio wins the next two [races], we just have to place fourth, so we should be able to do that,” Ganassi calculated, correctly as it turned out.
If Castroneves dominates the remaining rounds at Belle Isle Park this weekend and at Chicagoland Speedway the Sunday after that, he could win a maximum of 106 points, increasing his season's total to 639. With six-time race winner Dixon currently sitting on 576 points, 'just' 63 points would be required from the final two races, an average of 31.5 points per race, just under the 32 awarded for a fourth-place finish, to claim his second series championship.
However, it would only take a repeat of Sunday's race for Dixon and Ganassi to start reaching for their calculators again.
The Kiwi made the first of his expected three pit-stops under the race's only full-course caution while running in the top five on lap 16, but was shuffled back out of the top ten during the next two stops as slower traffic and an inability to overtake on the undulating Wine Country circuit ultimately proved costly.
Dixon's lowest finish since St Petersburg in April was only his third finish outside the top ten all season, and left the Indy 500 winner scratching his head.
![Scott Dixon - Target Chip Ganassi Racing [pic credit: IRL/McQueeney]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/483221.jpg)
