Ross Brothers Muscle Car Garage custodian Nelson Eves looks over the new addition to the motoring museum, Scott Dixon's 2005 Number 9 Target Panoz G-Force Toyota. Photo / Dean Taylor
Ross Brothers Muscle Car Garage custodian Nelson Eves looks over the new addition to the motoring museum, Scott Dixon's 2005 Number 9 Target Panoz G-Force Toyota. Photo / Dean Taylor
By any measure, Scott Dixon is one of New Zealand’s finest and most successful sportspeople, but one Waipā family doesn’t think he gets the recognition in his own country he deserves. So they have done something about it.
Cambridge’s Ross brothers own C & R Developments, but more importantly for this story, they also own the wonderful Ross Brothers Muscle Car Garage – a celebration of motoring and earth-moving history that has gained a huge following for the quality of the vehicles, the presentation and the hospitality.
With a huge involvement in motorsport, the boys thought it was only right Dixon’s amazing achievements should be more widely celebrated in his home country – and as owners of a motoring museum what better way than to buy and display one of his race cars?
Modern Day IndyCar legend Scott Dixon.
The team at C&R Developments had known Dixon since he was a 9-year-old and had followed his rise in the auto-racing scene.
It has taken some serious negotiating, over a long period of time – but finally, a genuine Scott Dixon Indy car is in New Zealand and on display.
The car is the 2005 Number 9 Target Panoz G-Force Toyota he raced for his long-time team Chip Ganassi Racing.
Scott Dixon, driver of the #9 Target Ganassi Racing Panoz Toyota, celebrates in victory lane after winning the Indy Racing League IndyCar Series Inaugural Watkins Glen Indy Grand Prix on September 25, 2005 at Watkins Glen International in Watkins Glen, New York. (Photo by Gavin Lawrence/Getty Images)
Nelson Eves, who looks after the Ross Brothers Muscle Car Garage and workshop, used some of his contacts to help seal the deal.
He also has a son-in-law who has lived in America since 1997 with contacts in the automotive racing scene who was able to help with negotiations and arrangements.
Eves raced for four years in America and was then crew chief for Western Union Speed Team, which was owned by Keith Duesenberg, grandson of the famous automotive manufacturing founder and keen racer.
Eves ran Phil Giebler and, for a time, a member of one of America’s most famous racing dynasties, Al Unser jnr jnr.
He says he knows from experience that race wins and series wins in America don’t come easy, and IndyCar success comes about from years of hard work and planning.
“It is a complete programme and everything has to go right to record a victory,” he says.
“So the importance of winning the Indianapolis 500, the biggest single sporting event in the World with 400,000 spectators on course, cannot be underestimated.”
He says teams like Chip Ganassi Racing don’t often sell race cars, even when they are replaced.
In Indy Car, teams will buy or develop a chassis built to the class formula and add the bodywork.
Most parts are also to a formula, but teams can do modifications within rules to improve the aero package and handling.
Engines are also built to a formula by a handful of manufacturers and leased to teams. After about 1600km of use they are returned.
Scott Dixon's 2005 Number 9 Target Panoz G-Force Toyota takes pride of place in the Ross Brothers Muscle Car Garage in Cambridge. Photo / Dean Taylor
The 2005 Target Panoz G-Force Toyota, like most other retired race cars, was “racked and stacked” in the Chip Ganassi Racing headquarters.
It doesn’t have an engine, as that was returned to Toyota, but is presented as raced for much of the 2005 season.
It wasn’t Dixon’s best season, but that was also a reason the car was able to be purchased.
Eves says teams never sell important or championship-winning cars.
Scott Dixon leads a pack of cars in his #9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing Toyota Panoz during the IRL IndyCar Series Toyota Indy 300 on March 6, 2005 at Homestead-Miami Speedway in Homestead, Florida. (Photo by Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)
The 2005 car was the last time Dixon raced with a Toyota engine, and has had the most success with Honda, although the team also used Chevrolet engines in 2014-2016 .
He had just one win in the car – taking out the Indy Racing League IndyCar Series Inaugural Watkins Glen Indy Grand Prix. It was an otherwise disappointing season after the inaugural success in 2003 and promise of 2004.
In fact Dixon was in danger of losing his drive, according to Wikipedia, and the win at Watkins Glen meant he was signed on for another two years.
In 2005 Dixon and his Ganassi teammates, Ryan Briscoe and Darren Manning, were struggling, and they wrote off or seriously damaged 28 cars in a long series of crashes.
Manning was fired and Australian Briscoe narrowly avoided serious injury when his car became airborne and disintegrated after touching another car and slammed into the outside retaining wall of Chicagoland Speedway’s third turn.
Serious success didn’t return until 2008, when Dixon won the Indianapolis 500 and the IndyCar Series.
He then went on to win the series again in 2013, 2015, 2018 and 2020.
Scott Dixon celebrates his 2015 IndyCar Championship victory. Supplied
PICTURE Chevrolet Racing
NZH 09mar16 -
NZH 12Mar16 - Scott Dixon is now fifth on the all-time IndyCar winners' list. Picture / Chevrolet Racing
When he signed for Chip Ganassi Racing for 2022, his 21st season, he set a record for the longest tenure for a driver in team history. Overall, 2022 was Dixon’s 22nd season in the NTT IndyCar Series.
He took out two wins this year and finished third in the series, holding off fellow Kiwi Scott McLaughlin.
Dixon has the most wins of any active IndyCar driver, with 53, ranking him second on the all-time IndyCar win list to AJ Foyt (67). Foyt, with seven titles, is just one series win ahead of Dixon.
Dixon also has an IndyCar record, winning at least one race across 20 seasons.
His success hasn’t just come in IndyCar, and Scott has numerous titles and wins in a number of classes since taking out the New Zealand Formula Vee Class II championship in 1994.
His sporting achievements have been recognised by his home country twice, when he was named Sportsperson of the Year in 2008 and 2013 and in 2009 he was inducted into the MotorSport New Zealand Wall of Fame.
Dixon was honoured by Queen Elizabeth II in 2019 on the 66th anniversary of her coronation when he was appointed a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit.
The team at Ross Brothers hope having the IndyCar in pride of place as people enter the museum will create more recognition for Dixon and his achievements.
Scott Dixon in action in 2015. Photo / Phillip Abbott/LAT and GM
And, as they point out, he is still at the top of his game and has the opportunity to not only add his name to that of racing legend AJ Foyt, but possibly surpass him.
Ross Brothers Muscle Car Garage is at C&R Developments, 162 Hannon Rd, Cambridge. It is open most weekdays from 9am and at other times for clubs, functions and private events by arrangement.
For more information, contact Nelson Eves, 027 853 8676.
