Chip Ganassi Racing recently captured its record-setting 18th NTT IndyCar SERIES championship, prompting a look back at the defining title-winning campaigns in the outfit's history. Curt Cavin points to the turbulent 1996 season, a year marred by the politics of a bitterly divided sport that often robbed its stars of proper recognition. Amid that chaos, Jimmy Vasser earned Chip Ganassi Racing's very first season championship. Vasser stormed out of the gates by winning three of Champ Car's first four races and famously claimed the highly anticipated U.S. 500 at Michigan International Speedway over Memorial Day weekend, a direct counter to the Indy Racing League's Indianapolis 500. He ultimately finished 22 points ahead of Michael Andretti and Alex Zanardi, besting a brilliant field containing eight drivers who would earn series championships in their careers. Because of the open-wheel split, Vasser missed out on racing at Indy for four of his absolute peak years, leaving his immense talent underappreciated. Vasser secured two other top-three series finishes, taking third in 1997 and second in 1998, alongside eight poles and 10 victories during that fiercely competitive era.
For Eric Smith, Arni Sribhen, and Paul Kelly, the choice is unequivocally the 2009 season. Dario Franchitti had endured a disappointing stint in NASCAR following his 2007 IndyCar SERIES title with Andretti Autosport, leading many to believe he was done with open-wheel racing altogether after a brief, aborted foray into stock cars with Chip Ganassi Racing in 2008. But Ganassi put Franchitti back in an IndyCar SERIES car for 2009, sparking a stunning comeback. Franchitti secured a narrow championship by just 11 points over teammate Scott Dixon, sealing the title at the season finale at Homestead where Dixon was forced to pit with eight laps to go while trying to stretch his fuel strategy, relegating him to third in the race and second in the standings.
That 2009 campaign was an absolute masterclass of dominance from the two-driver lineup. Franchitti and Dixon combined to win 10 of the 17 races that year, tying the team's 1998 mark for the most wins by a single squad in a season. Franchitti managed 15 top-10 finishes while Dixon logged 14, with the pair lifting Franchitti into the status of a generation's greatest by sparking the first of three straight title runs alongside two Indy 500 wins over the next four seasons.
Paul Kelly elevates 2009 above all other years for specific structural reasons. While Chip Ganassi Racing drivers had previously finished 1-2 in the standings—with Alex Zanardi and Jimmy Vasser achieving the feat in 1998, and Alex Palou and Dixon doing so in 2023—the 2009 effort was uniquely lean. Franchitti and Dixon were the team's only two drivers that year, unlike Team Penske's five 1-2 championship finishes since 2014 which relied on three- or four-driver rosters capable of absorbing a teammate's down year. Furthermore, the intra-team battle in 2009 was razor-thin compared to blowouts like Zanardi's 116-point gap over Vasser in 1998 or Palou beating Dixon by 78 points in 2023. It was a fierce, fantastic fight between two absolute titans of the sport.
