A half-century of Southern California motorsports will be celebrated this weekend with the 50th running of the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach (Sunday, 4:30 p.m. ET, FOX, FOX Deportes, FOX Sports App, INDYCAR Radio Network).

While the event began with a Formula 5000 race in 1975, the NTT INDYCAR SERIES and its predecessors have played a significant role in making this North America’s street course showcase. Certainly, no other such event – past or present – has the prestige of this one.

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Racing today is on an 11-turn, 1.968-mile circuit that zooms down Shoreline Drive, with a quick left/right navigation of the Aquarium of the Pacific Fountain. The fast and furious action continues, especially in the charge toward hard braking zones at Turns 8 and 9. Then comes the curves leading to the iconic hairpin in place since the event’s inception.

Many of the sport’s best drivers have mastered this course. Scott Dixon, this series’ six-time season champion, won last year’s race, giving Chip Ganassi Racing a record-tying seventh Long Beach victory. Dixon won this event for the first time in 2015. Team Penske, the winningest organization in series history, also has won seven times, most recently with two-time Indianapolis 500 champion Josef Newgarden in 2022.

Last year, Dixon held off Newgarden, Andretti Global’s Colton Herta and CGR teammate Alex Palou, the series champion of three of the past four seasons, in a thriller, and all four drivers return for what should be another memorable weekend at The Beach.

A look at what’s to come:

Celebrating Long Beach’s History

The first task of the Grand Prix Association of Long Beach was to prove to Formula One that it could host a major event in what was then a depressed industrial port city 25 miles south of Los Angeles. It was no easy assignment to bring Chris Pook’s vision to life, and still today there are people who say they walked in for that first event without paying. Those attending the inaugural race saw SCCA champion Brian Redman win in a Lola fielded by Carl Haas Racing.

F1 arrived in Long Beach in 1976 with much fanfare, but it wasn’t until popular American driver Mario Andretti, the ’69 Indy winner, won in ’77 that the event became a signature event. Future winners included world champions Nelson Piquet, Alan Jones and Niki Lauda.

The event switched to the INDYCAR SERIES in 1984, and appropriately it was Andretti who was the first to reach victory lane. Andretti also won in ’85 and ’87 with his son Michael capturing the first of his two Long Beach wins in ’86. That was Michael’s first series win; interestingly, the last win of his career also came in this event, in 2002.

This weekend, event organizers will have several races featuring vintage cars of all three major classes – Formula 5000, F1 and INDYCAR – in a nod to the 50th anniversary.

A Race of Champions

Perhaps no other event can lay a better claim to championship status than Long Beach.

The first 27 races held under the INDYCAR banner were won by drivers who either were or became season champions and/or won Indy. Al Unser Jr., a two-time series champion with a pair of Indy 500 wins, leads all drivers with seven Long Beach victories. Paul Tracy won four times, Sebastien Bourdais three times.

Other champions or Indy 500 winners with Long Beach victories: Danny Sullivan, Jimmy Vasser, Alex Zanardi (two), Juan Pablo Montoya, Helio Castroneves, Power (twice), Dario Franchitti, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Takuma Sato, Simon Pagenaud and Alexander Rossi (twice).

Today’s Stars Set for Another Winning Run

Five drivers in the top 10 of this year’s standings are former Long Beach winners, including Dixon (third) and Andretti Global drivers Kyle Kirkwood (sixth) and Herta (eighth).

Dixon, Rossi (ninth) and Power (14th) have the event twice each. Newgarden (seventh) is the other.

Remarkably, neither Palou, the series leader after winning the season’s first two races, nor Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward, who is second in the standings, have won at Long Beach, but it’s not without solid efforts. Palou has finished in the top five of each of his four starts, including last year’s third-place finish, while O’Ward finished fifth in 2022.

Andretti Global has a history of considerable success in the event. In addition to the wins of Herta (2021) and Kirkwood (2023), the organization founded by Michael Andretti won the INDYCAR SERIES race in 2010 with Hunter-Reay, in 2011 with Mike Conway and twice with Rossi (2018 and ’19). The team’s current lineup, which includes 2022 Indy winner Marcus Ericsson in the No. 28 Bryant Honda, has won three street races over the past two seasons, including a 1-2 finish in last year’s Ontario Honda Dealers Indy Toronto. Herta finished second last year with Kirkwood (No. 27 PreFab Honda) seventh. Both drivers led laps in the race.

Last Year’s Thriller

Dixon has won 58 races in his decorated career, and not many were as stressful as last year’s race in Long Beach.

Dixon qualified in the eighth position and wasn’t sure he had the speed to overcome several of those starting ahead of him. The driver of the No. 9 PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing Honda made the second of his two pit stops on Lap 51 and moved into the lead when Herta made his final stop 10 laps later in the No. 26 Gainbridge Honda.

The question in the final stage of the race was whether Dixon could stretch his fuel and tires far enough to finish the race with sufficient pace, and that took on even greater significance in the final 10 laps with Newgarden, Herta and Palou closing in. Dixon got some help when Herta bumped Newgarden out of second place in the hairpin, but Dixon did enough down the stretch to hold off the chargers to win by .9798 of a second.

Dixon raves about Long Beach.

“It’s a tough track,” he said. “You’ve got big braking zones, you’ve got strategy that always comes into it. It’s quite technical.

“Obviously, the track has been through many different iterations throughout the years, but I would say since the first time I saw it in 1999 it’s basically stayed the same, which makes for great racing.”

This Year’s Competitive Field

It's worth noting that Meyer Shank Racing’s Felix Rosenqvist won the NTT P1 Award for last year’s race. This year, the driver of the No. 60 SiriusXM Honda is effectively a teammate of Dixon and Palou as their teams have a technical alliance that has served Rosenqvist well in the first two races (finishes of seventh and fifth, respectively). He stands fifth in points.

Arrow McLaren finished second and third, respectively, in the most recent race, The Thermal Club INDYCAR Grand Prix at The Thermal Club. O’Ward seemed on his way to winning the race in the No. 5 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet before Palou ran him down in the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda. Christian Lundgaard finished third in the No. 7 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet. O’Ward and Lundgaard are second and fourth in the standings.

Don’t sleep on Newgarden, either. The driver of the No. 2 Astemo Team Penske Chevrolet not only has a Long Beach race win on his resume, but he led 19 laps in last year’s race before being resigned to fourth place thanks to the bump from Herta.

Power is another threat to end Palou’s streak of wins to begin the season. The driver of the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet counts the final Champ Car race at this track in 2008 as one of his favorite wins, and he also went to victory lane in 2012 and has amassed three NTT P1 Awards as the fastest qualifier in this event (2009, 2010 and 2011). He led 15 laps in last year’s race before finishing sixth.

Andretti Global had three of the top seven finishers in last year’s race. Rossi now drives Ed Carpenter Racing’s No. 20 ECR Java House Chevrolet, and he has consistently been fast at this track, winning a pair of poles.

But with 27 car-and-driver combinations, including 14 drivers who have won races in this series, it could be anyone’s checkered flag. The first practice is at 6:05 p.m. ET Friday on FS1.