IndyCar’s Mr. Mid-Ohio owns five wins at track

• Mid-Ohio President Craig Rust has awarded trophies to Scott Dixon seven times at three tracks.
• Dixon owns five IndyCar wins at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course since 2007.
• The New Zealander has won three of the last four Honda Indy 200s at Mid-Ohio.
• The race will be Sunday at 2 p.m. with qualifying Saturday afternoon.

LEXINGTON – Craig Rust is the president of Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, but he’s also Scott Dixon’s personal rabbit’s foot, four-leaf clover and heads-up penny.

When Rust was a young executive working at Nazareth Speedway in Pennsylvania, he presented a then little-known rookie from New Zealand the winner’s trophy in 2001.

Rust moved on to running Watkins Glen, where he met Dixon in the winner’s circle for three straight years. Flash ahead to his current stint at Mid-Ohio and Rust has shaken the winning hand of Dixon three more times.

“The number of times I’ve presented him, it’s got to be the most wins any track president has had with any one driver with moving around to three different tracks. It’s funny,” Rust said.

Dixon didn’t realize the Rust effect until he was told this week.

“That’s crazy, but that’s good,” he said.

Truth is, Dixon is good at just about any track. He’s a three-time Verizon IndyCar Series champion, a one-time Indianapolis 500 winner with 24 career poles and 37 victories, which ranks fifth on the all-time list. But when it comes to Mid-Ohio’s twisty 2.25-mile layout, no one is better than Dixon.

“He’s so good. You just see it. He’s got it figured out,” Rust said.

Emerson Fittipaldi won three times at Mid-Ohio. Legends like Bobby Rahal, Michael Andretti, Al Unser Jr. and Alex Zanardi won twice in Lexington. Dixon has done it five times since 2007, winning three of the last four Honda Indy 200s at Mid-Ohio.

“Every driver has a track where you always get a break,” IndyCar driver Simon Pagenaud said. “You might be the most competitive of all at that track and you win, or you might not be competitive and you get a break and you win. We want that one track that smiles at you, and it’s just inexplicable sometimes.”

Mid-Ohio is a perpetual happy face for Dixon. He’s won from the pole. He’s won by saving fuel. He’s won with expert pit stops and innate timing. And last year, he won despite starting from the back of the grid.

“Last year was a lot of luck,” he said, adding that the team changed strategies on the fly and was rewarded when Ryan Hunter-Reay caused a caution which allowed Dixon to pit ahead of everyone else. “Days like that things fall into place.

“I think a lot of it comes down to style, too. I’d like to think as a team and myself that we’re good at most tracks, but this is one that definitely comes more naturally.”

Graham Rahal spent two years affiliated with Chip Ganassi Racing and wishes he could have gleaned more from Dixon and that side of the team during his tenure.

“Scott is top-notch,” Rahal said. “When you go to a place you like and know you’re going to have a good race car with the way the races have gone there with a little fuel saving over the last few years, he’s the best at that sort of thing. That race plays into Scott’s strengths, which are pretty much everything, but particularly into his areas.

“I wish I had learned more and figured out where the shortcuts were because he found them.”

Part of the connection Dixon has with Mid-Ohio stems from his memories as kid growing up in New Zealand.

“You didn’t have tracks in the cities, so you went out in the country (where it is) isolated,” he said. “When I raced back then, we would camp in a tent. It does have a lot of fun memories like that. The track style-wise is very similar to the tracks in my early career.”

It suits Dixon so well, he is now Mr. Mid-Ohio when it comes to IndyCar racing.

“It’s definitely a special environment,” he said. “It’s a fun weekend.”

rmccurdy@gannett.com

419-521-7241

Twitter: @McMotorsport

2015 IndyCar Winners, Poles

•St. Petersburg: Juan Pablo Montoya (winner), Will Power (pole).

•New Orleans: James Hinchcliffe (W), Montoya (P based on points).

•Long Beach: Scott Dixon (W), Helio Castroneves (P).

•Barber: Josef Newgarden (W), Castroneves (P).

•GP of Indy: Power (W), Power (P).

•Indy 500: Montoya (W), Dixon (P).

•Detroit 1: Carlos Munoz (W), Power (P).

•Detroit 2: Sebastien Bourdais (W), Montoya (P based on points).

•Texas: Dixon (W), Power (P).

•Toronto: Newgarden (W), Power (P).

•California: Graham Rahal (W), Simon Pagenaud (P).

•Milwaukee: Bourdais (W), Newgarden (P).

•Iowa: Ryan Hunter-Reay (W), Castroneves (P).

•Mid-Ohio: Sunday.

•Pocono: Aug. 23.

•Sonoma: Aug. 30.

— Verizon IndyCar Series