- Scott Dixon cannot begin working with Arrow McLaren until January 1, 2027, as Chip Ganassi Racing is enforcing a non-compete clause through the end of his contract.
- The 46-year-old, six-time champion will spend the rest of 2026 on what the paddock calls “gardening leave,” unable to test, sim, or work with his new team.
- The delay mirrors a similar restriction Will Power faced leaving Team Penske and signals a shift toward Formula 1-style contract enforcement inside IndyCar.
A Legend Told to Wait
Scott Dixon spent 25 seasons building Chip Ganassi Racing into the winningest organization of his generation. He won six championships there, more than any active driver in the series, and became the face of a team that grew up around him. When he decided to leave for Arrow McLaren after the 2026 season, most assumed the transition would be simple, a handshake, a farewell tour, and a clean handoff to his new team.
Instead, Dixon is stuck in limbo. Ganassi is holding him to the full term of his contract, which runs through December 31, and that means the 46-year-old cannot sit in an Arrow McLaren simulator, visit the shop, or do any meaningful work with his new employer before the calendar turns to 2027.
“Obviously it’s not ideal, but it was a deal that he signed,” Arrow McLaren team president Tony Kanaan told RACER. “So we’re just going to be as prepared as we can for when he’s going to come here, sit in the car, be in the shop, and we do the proper intro to the team. In the meantime, we can’t do anything about it.”
What “Gardening Leave” Means for a Six-Time Champion
The practice has a name borrowed from corporate law and long used in Formula 1: gardening leave, the period after an employee gives notice but before their contract officially ends, while they are kept away from any work that could benefit a competitor. It is standard in F1 paddocks. In IndyCar, it has been rare, applied mostly to engineers and team managers rather than a driver of Dixon’s stature.
A heartfelt farewell between Ganassi and Dixon was staged at the season finale at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, the kind of send-off usually reserved for drivers who are done with the sport entirely rather than switching allegiances to a direct rival. The emotional send-off and the contractual reality now sitting alongside it capture an awkward truth about Dixon’s exit: the team is plainly grateful for what he built, and it is also protecting its competitive information from him for three more months.
Dixon is not the first high-profile driver to run into this wall. Two-time IndyCar champion Will Power faced the identical restriction when he left Team Penske for Andretti Global at the end of 2025. Penske required both Power and former managing director Ron Ruzewski to sit out until January 1 before beginning work with their new team, a decision that raised eyebrows at the time and now looks like the start of a pattern rather than an isolated case.
Not Every Departing Driver Faces the Same Wait
The contrast within Arrow McLaren’s own driver room makes the situation sting more. Felix Rosenqvist, who is leaving Meyer Shank Racing to replace Christian Lundgaard at Arrow McLaren, faces no restriction of that kind and has already begun working with his new team.
“Felix is fully open, so he is already going to the sim and doing a bunch of things with us,” Kanaan said. “And for him, it is like coming home. I was able to keep the majority of the people still here, as far as his mechanics and engineering staff since he left, so he’s coming right back to the people he already knew.”
Rosenqvist’s transition is a reunion. Dixon’s is a standoff. The gap between the two situations comes down to what each driver’s outgoing team decided to enforce, and Ganassi chose the stricter path with the driver who defined its last quarter century.
The Seat Dixon Leaves Behind
While Dixon waits out his contract, Ganassi has moved to fill the vacancy he leaves in the No. 9 Honda. Christian Lundgaard, who completed his two-year deal with Arrow McLaren and was released after finishing third in points, winning twice, and adding five more podiums including one on an oval, is expected to take over the car Dixon vacates. Kanaan would not confirm the move directly to RACER, but he made clear Lundgaard is available.
“He’s been free since the end of the year,” Kanaan said. “I know because he came here to give his company car back and made sure he told everybody that he was gonna go get his Honda Passport at the other team.”
The detail is small, almost throwaway, but it captures how quickly and cleanly Lundgaard’s exit from Arrow McLaren has gone compared to Dixon’s. One driver turned in his company car and moved on. The other is sitting out the season he helped his old team compete in, unable to so much as visit the shop of the team he will drive for next year.
A Career Built on Patience Now Tested by It
Few drivers in IndyCar history have shown more patience than Dixon. He debuted in 2001, has raced into his mid-40s, and has adapted through multiple chassis and engine formula changes while staying at the front of the field. His 2026 season, by his own standards, was unusual. It marked his first winless campaign in twenty-two years, a gap that made the timing of his exit from Ganassi feel less like a legend riding into the sunset and more like a competitor who sensed his current environment had run its course.
Now that competitor has to sit and watch. Dixon cannot test the car he will race next season. He cannot build chemistry with a new engineering group before the pressure of a race weekend forces it. He can only wait, the same way any employee serving out a notice period waits, except this employee has six championships and one of the most recognizable names in American open-wheel racing.
What This Means for IndyCar’s Next Silly Season
The Dixon situation is likely to change how future driver moves get negotiated across the paddock. Team owners who watched Ganassi and Penske both enforce full contract terms against departing stars now have a template, and agents representing drivers who are considering a move will need to account for the possibility of a forced sabbatical before a new employer can put them in a car.
For Dixon personally, the wait ends at midnight on January 1, when he becomes eligible to join Arrow McLaren in full. Edward Jones has already signed on as the first primary sponsor for his new entry, a sign the team is building around him for the long term even while it cannot yet put him behind the wheel. Until then, one of the winningest drivers in IndyCar history gets an unfamiliar assignment: nothing to do but watch the clock.
A Rivalry Reshuffled by the Wait
Dixon’s absence from any McLaren activity also delays a storyline fans have wanted for years: what happens when he lines up as Alex Palou’s rival rather than his one-time Ganassi teammate. Palou, the reigning and five-time IndyCar champion, spent seasons racing alongside Dixon inside the same organization. Starting in 2027, the two will be on opposite sides of the garage wall, and every bit of preparation time Dixon loses to his notice period is preparation time Palou’s own team gets to build a countermeasure against him.
Kanaan’s comments made clear Arrow McLaren has no path around the restriction and is simply managing the wait as best it can, filling the months with logistics, sponsor rollout, and staffing so that the moment Dixon walks in the door in January, the only thing left to do is put him in the car. For a driver whose career has been defined by getting the most out of every session available to him, the ongoing challenge is one he has never faced: a season with a car waiting for him that he is legally barred from touching.
Sources:
- https://racer.com/2026/09/29/ganassi-keeping-dixon-on-gardening-leave-through-year-s-end
- https://racer.com/2026/09/22/september-brings-some-surpring-wrinkles-to-indycar-s-silly-season
