Kansas City, KS (My Sportsbook) - After a miserable start to the 2009 IndyCar Series season, defending points champion Scott Dixon bounced back with a victory in the Road Runner Turbo Indy 300 at Kansas Speedway.

Dixon, who crashed in the season-opener earlier this month at St. Petersburg, Florida and finished 15th last week at Long Beach, California, led the most laps at Kansas with 134. But Dixon had to benefit from a pit-road mishap from Ryan Briscoe.

After Dixon's Target Chip Ganassi Racing teammate, Dario Franchitti, made contact with the wall on lap 152, Briscoe, the race leader, dipped onto the deceleration lap to pit but didn't cross the timing line before the caution flag waved. He had to drive through pit road without service before making his stop on the following lap.

Dixon grabbed the lead for the final time on lap 155 but had to hold off a late-race charge from Helio Castroneves to secure his 17th career IndyCar victory, putting him two wins away from tying Sam Hornish Jr. for the most wins all-time in the series.

"I think we were trimmed to win as they say," Dixon said. "It's still very tight, and we're still within a shot to win this championship. We're definitely looking strong going into Indy."

Dixon moved from 17th to fourth in points after his Kansas victory. He is the defending champion of the Indianapolis 500, which is the next event, scheduled for May 24th.

Castroneves, competing in his second race of the season, overcame an incident with Vitor Meira in the early-going. The Brazilian driver, who started from the rear of the field after his qualifying time was disallowed for driving below the white line, rammed into the back of Meira and suffered damage to the nose of his car. He pitted twice for repairs but recovered nicely, finishing 0.7104 seconds behind Dixon.

"You want to win, but Scott did a hell of a job," Castroneves said. "Today was a very good day in both ways, the championship points and also preparing for the big race, which is Indy."

Tony Kanaan finished third, and Briscoe, who lost three positions after his final pit stop, came in fourth. Danica Patrick completed the top-five.

"It's a solid result, but it's really disappointing," Briscoe said. "We had the car to win, and we had the track position until we got caught out with that yellow. It's really unfortunate."

Briscoe, who won at St. Petersburg, led 53 laps before handing the top position to Dixon for the final time.

Marco Andretti, Graham Rahal, Hideki Mutoh, Ed Carpenter and Dan Wheldon, who won the past two races at Kansas, finished sixth through 10th, respectively.

Kanaan grabbed a one-point lead over Briscoe, with Dario Franchitti dropping to third in the standings. Franchitti ended up finishing 18th.