Dixon on Johnson: “He could fit right in here”

IndyCar’s five-timer was overjoyed to see how well NASCAR’s seven-timer performed in his first test for Chip Ganassi Racing. NTT IndyCar Series championship leader Scott Dixon isn’t one to offer false praise -- even for a good friend like Jimmie Johnson -- which made his thoughts about the Californian’s run in the No. 10 NTT DATA Honda around the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course on Tuesday worth hearing.

“His performance is what you would expect from a seven-time champion, and someone with his knowledge and general approach came through,” Dixon told RACER. “He’s really thorough, and he's an intense person, and was trying to make sure that he does things correctly and he doesn't let anybody down, whereas I feel like some drivers don't really care about that factor.

“The thing that I enjoyed was the eagerness; the night before the test, he was texting me, ‘Hey man, what about even getting out of the pits? Is there a technique?’ There was just tons of questions of making sure he has things covered. He had overlays and video, and he kept asking for a lot of information to try and understand what he needs to do and how to do it better. Then during the day, we got into how to change his line, because there was definitely a lot of what I assume to be Cup-esque kind of things with how he was driving the course, and when we’d talk about it, he’d adapt immediately to driving like an IndyCar driver.”

Dixon was impressed by how ready Johnson was to adapt his approach based on experience as his test progressed.

Although Johnson had a chance to turn a limited number of laps in an older McLaren Formula 1 car in 2018, Tuesday’s IndyCar test was the former off-road racer’s first significant outing in an open-wheel car. Completing 120 laps -- 40 more than the length of the July 4 GMR Grand Prix won by Dixon -- the 44-year-old began to trust his instincts with a chassis that, in comparison to the No. 48 Chevy Camaro Cup machine he races for Hendrick Motorsports, barely rolls or heaves in the corners, or while braking and accelerating.

Getting attuned to the whispers of feedback being provided by the 750hp Dallara DW12-Honda and reacting swiftly to those inputs was another area where Johnson’s adaptation to IndyCar impressed Dixon.

More IndyCar

Lundgaard eager to find his place within Ganassi’s winning culture

ECR extends Chevy IndyCar partnership

The RACER Mailbag, October 7

“Especially, even with Turn 14 -- the last corner onto the front straight -- just the way he would approach it to start was very different to how we would typically do it in the way of placing loading the tires, and he was trying to induce some understeer, because that corner can be quite neutral,” he said.

“So there's a lot of preconceived styles that you have coming in from a different type of racing, but he was very good at changing things and he was very fluid, which was really good to see. It was never rushed, and he was never overexerting himself; it was just making sure that he learned as much as he could while enjoying it. You would expect a guy like him to be up to speed quickly on an oval, but these are tricky cars to drive on a road course, and he’s a fast learner. Whatever was thrown at him to change, he did it, and looked at ease while doing it. Pretty remarkable.”

Dixon also enjoyed watching Johnson push -- and occasionally exceed -- the limits of the No. 10 Honda. It made for more learning opportunities as he got a feel for thousands of pounds of downforce and how it needs to be managed throughout each lap.

“An Indy car doesn't have excessive amounts of downforce like it used to, but it’s still a lot,” he said. “Jimmie did get caught out a couple times just with the amount of yaw in the car. Where in Cup you can have probably 20 degrees of yaw before it really starts to get out of control and spin, in an Indy car, anything more than five to seven degrees means you're going to spin out.

“He had some moments like that in Turn 4, but he was very good at understanding that I'm going to push it here to try and find the limit knowing that I can't really hit anything. It was never, ‘Hey, I'm going to go flat in Turn 14 straight away, and if it sticks it sticks…’ He did it in ways where you could see he did a very good job in building up to it. Even the braking, he was showing how he knew to hit the pedal hard and then start the bleeding off of pressure when the car slows and downforce comes off.”

“I think he had done his homework -- he had looked at it, he understood a lot of things, and guys like him that have excelled in their careers do it because they have insane car control and the understanding of what a car is going to do...”

As a teenage Indy Lights champion stepping into his first CART IndyCar test, Dixon went through a similar learning process in figuring out the proper braking technique in a high-downforce open-wheeler.

“Even I struggled with that going from an Indy Lights car to when I first drove a CART car at Putnam Park,” he said. “I remember that my brake traces weren’t great; I had to work hard on making sure that I got the amount of peak that I needed to start with, and then trail off, and I’d been in Lights and open-wheel cars with wings for a long time by that point.

“I think he had done his homework -- he had looked at it, he understood a lot of things, and guys like him that have excelled in their careers do it because they have insane car control and the understanding of what a car is going to do. So I don't think it was a huge shock to him, it's just he was very good at the process of getting to the point of cause to spinning or finding the maximum.”

Dixon loves the idea of having Johnson in the IndyCar field next year, and hopes the NASCAR star books a few more tests in anticipation of an open-wheel move once he retires from Cup at the end of the season.

“I absolutely think he could fit right in here,” he said. “I think there's only one reason he would really want to process this situation, or even go down the road here, and that’s to be totally competitive. Yes, it will take a little bit of time; gone are the days where you had 50 days of testing a year. That's the thing I said yesterday, that the biggest thing for Jimmie would have been having a second day in the car. After the first day, the second day in a new car, everything flows so much easier. You're not having to worry about how do I get out of the pits, or what button do I push. It just flows so much better.

“So I have no doubt that he will be competitive. Will it take a little bit? Sure, because it's always hard to find those little bits of time, but then also on the backside, he has such a great understanding of the strategy and what you need to do, and he would be a guy that would cover all the areas, too. So if you found a situation where they could take advantage of it, he would absolutely take advantage of it.”

Having Johnson under the CGR tent is another scenario Dixon would welcome.

“If he does decide to do it, I think it would be great if he was at Ganassi. I think there's plenty of options out there for him, but I know it would be interesting,” he noted. “It would be really cool, and to line up beside him, or with Jimmie as a teammate, I think would be amazing, man.

“I think especially somebody like him, with what he's accomplished, a slight change of possibly doing something a little bit different really excites him at this point too. You can just see his pure passion for wanting to race. Does he need to do this? Absolutely not. It's really out of pure love for the sport and for driving other things. Even if you look at where and how we got to doing what he did with NASCAR was probably not a road he thought he was going to go down. It was fun to see how he works, and how much he enjoys just driving.”