Here we are again. Five-hundred miles. Five hundred miles is all that separate us from crowning a champion. Eighteen races are behind us. Nine different drivers have stood on the top step of the podium but only two are fighting to make it to the mountain top.
Scott Dixon had a summer of a lifetime. Three consecutive wins got the Kiwi right back in the championship picture but the consistent season of Helio Castroneves was keeping him for the points lead. Until the leaves start turning color and Castroneves' fortune did a 180 with gearbox issues in both races of the Houston doubleheader while Dixon summer extended into an Indian Summer when he picked up a win and second at Reliant Park.
Dixon is leading Castroneves by twenty-five points. Castroneves will find himself fighting from behind again if he wants to win his first career IndyCar championship. Dixon finds himself on defense as he looks to pick up his third title since 2003 and Ganassi's fifth title in six seasons of reunified American open-wheel racing.
Will Power, AJ Allmendinger and Sébastien Bourdais start on row one. A ChampCar reunion of sorts, Power looks to end his season by winning his third of the final five races while Allmendinger looks to potentially end his IndyCar career with a win, something he has not done since Road America 2006. Bourdais has not won since the "final" ChampCar race in 2007 at Mexico City and looks to get Dragon Racing their first race win (I know people say Long Beach 2008 was the final ChampCar race because it was split from the IRL which was in Motegi, it featured the Panoz DP01 but it didn't count toward a ChampCar championship, the series was already dead, the sanctioning body now known as IndyCar had taken them over and knew they couldn't not race at Long Beach. Mexico City was the final race of ChampCar in my eyes).
Charlie Kimball and James Jakes are the top two Hondas. They will start on row two along with Marco Andretti. Kimball looks to win his home race at Fontana while Jakes looks to better his career-best finish of second which accomplished earlier this season at Belle Isle. Marco Andretti sits fifth in the championship points standings, only two behind Justin Wilson for fourth as the American looks to pick up his first win since Iowa 2011 and set a career best finish in the point standings.
Ed Carpenter starts seventh as he looks to win his third consecutive season finale. Last year, Carpenter passed Dario Franchitti on the final lap, just as he had done in the season finale the year before to take the win prior to the yellow flag coming out for an accident involving Takuma Sato. James Hinchcliffe will look for his four win of the season from eighth on the grid. Despite three victories this season, Hinchcliffe finds himself ninth in points. Tony Kanaan starts ninth as this year's Indianapolis 500 winner will be going for a $250,000 bonus if he can win at Fontana and take two of three legs of the Triple Crown.
Carlos Muñoz starts tenth substituting for EJ Viso. This will be the Colombian's third career starts with his previous two coming earlier this season. He finished second at Indianapolis after starting second and finished seventeenth in race two at Toronto after having to substitute for Ryan Briscoe who broke his wrist in race one that weekend. Ryan Hunter-Reay's final race of his first championship reign will start from eleventh on the grid. Helio Castroneves starts twelfth after serving a top spot grid penalty for an engine change. The most points Castroneves can scored is fifty-three. Should he do that, the Brazilian would need Scott Dixon to finish worse than seventh.
Simon Pagenaud starts thirteenth with Oriol Servià starting fourteenth. Pagenaud has two wins this season and sits third in the standings. JR Hildebrand starts fifteenth, his first race since Sonoma and first oval since Indianapolis. The Californian was fired from Panther Racing after Indianapolis. Last year at Fontana, Hildebrand led fifty-six laps and finished eleventh.
Simona de Silvestro will start sixteenth. She was tenth fastest in the final practice session as she looks to get her first career top ten on an oval. Her best career oval finish was eleventh at Pocono and scored her first career podium in race one at Houston. Scott Dixon will start seventeenth. The Kiwi just has to keep Castroneves in his eyesight and he will likely take home his third championship tonight. For winning at Pocono, Dixon also has the shot at the $250,000 bonus for winning two of three legs of the Triple Crown. Justin Wilson will start eighteenth. He is fourth in the standings but will have some work to do in the race to keep Andretti from jumping pass him.
Pippa Mann starts nineteenth in her first appearance since Pocono earlier this year. Josef Newgarden will start twentieth. Newgarden scored his first career podium at Baltimore and the Tennessean has improved greatly in his sophomore season with four top-fives and seven top tens. Newgarden is serving a ten spot grid penalty for an engine change. Alex Tagliani will start twenty-first as he substitutes for an injured Dario Franchitti and serves a ten spot grid penalty. Tagliani has three top tens in four starts at Fontana.
Graham Rahal, Tristan Vautier and Sebastián Saavedra make up row eight. All are serving a ten spot grid penalty. Rahal has only one top fifteen finish on ovals this season. He finished fifth at Iowa. Due to being the only rookie to run a full-season, Vautier has clinched 2013 Rookie of the Year honors. Saavedra has not scored a top ten on an oval. His best career oval finish is thirteenth which he scored at Milwaukee earlier this year.
Takuma Sato rounds out the field in twenty-fifth after an engine change. The Japanese driver was leading the points after his win at Long Beach and a second at São Paulo earlier this season. Since Indianapolis, Sato has only one top ten and three finishes in the top fifteen.
NBCSN's coverage of the 2013 Izod IndyCar Series season finale, the MAVTV 500 begins at 8:00 p.m. ET with green flag around 9:10 p.m. ET.
Covering All Motorsports. From Indianapolis to Le Mans, Daytona to Monaco.
