Reigning NTT IndyCar Series champion Scott Dixon has called for the race distance of the Grand Prix of Long Beach to be extended in order to spice up the racing after Alexander Rossi dominated the race for a second successive year.
The race was largely processional despite Dixon's own late-race charge, this came after a slow pit-stop hampered his afternoon where he was able to rescue a podium finish after race officials intervened in the last-lap clash with Graham Rahal.
Dixon believes the current distance of 85 laps around the South Californian street circuit makes it too easy to manage tyre life, which in turn offers little in the way of creating different strategies to try to create opportunities to battle on-track.
When asked in the post-race press conference about what could be done to increase the on-track action, the five-time champion said: "It almost needs to be a longer race. I think IndyCar were trying to make it a longer race, but they kind of got turned down on that effect. It is an easy two-stopper for everybody, so it makes it pretty bland.
"Both tyres are good. You see a little more deg on the reds if you use a used set. All in all, they make the 30 laps, if you need to get them, pretty easy.
"But toward the end there with deg, we were able to pick a couple of cars off there. It’s just … it’s hard, right? For Firestone, they can probably make a tyre that’s got a lot of deg, but nobody’s really going to like it."
Championship leader Josef Newgarden who finished second ahead of Dixon in Sunday's race also suggested IndyCar officials look into possible changes at the event in order to make the race less 'straightforward'.
"This is honestly a very straightforward race," added the Penske driver. "Maybe it needs a small adjustment. The tyres are pretty friendly here.
"It's a pretty simple two-stop. All that added together, you're not going to get as much action as you get at other tracks. Yeah, maybe there's a little bit of room to think about it.
"I think it's just because it is a straightforward race. There's not a lot you can do strategy-wise to mix it up that's effective. I think that's why it produces what it did."
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