PORTLAND, Ore. -- Scott Dixon's race at Portland International Raceway -- and in all likelihood, his 2024 IndyCar championship hopes -- ended Sunday afternoon eight turns into the series' 110-lap race.

After being forced off-track from what he called an unnecessary "lunge" from Andretti Global's Kyle Kirkwood, a couple turns prior, Dixon dropped like a rock and lost five quick spots before Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing's Pietro Fittipaldi attempted to sneak inside Dixon in Turn 8 as he carried considerably more speed. Though he ran over the curb, Fittipaldi's left-side tires still banged against the right sides of Dixon, sending the six-time champ into the wall.

LIVE: IndyCar Series at Portland TV, start time, crashes, highlights on 8/25/24

According to the NBC Sports broadcast, Dixon's incident was the first time since 2005 at Motegi that the Chip Ganassi Racing driver has crashed out of a race on Lap 1. After he was seen and released from the infield care center, Dixon spoke with NBC and put the onus of the crash on Kirkwood, even though race control deemed Fittipaldi to be at fault -- handing the driver of the No. 30 Honda a drive-thru penalty for avoidable contact.

"The No. 27, I think, caused all that to be honest," he said. "(Kirkwood) just did a lunge and gave me zero room, shoved me off, and then you're trying to recover.

"Fittipaldi getting a penalty there? No fault on him. Penalty should've been on (Kirkwood)."

With the rest of the field making it through Lap 1 cleanly, Dixon will finish in last place (28th) for the second time this year after, following a Mid-Ohio race earlier this summer where his hybrid unit failed on the pace laps, leaving him nearly two-dozen laps down before engineers from Honda and CGR got him back running. At the time of Dixon's crash on Sunday, while his teammate and championship leader Alex Palou sat in his 3rd-place starting position, Dixon sat 95 points out of the championship lead in 5th-place with just three races remaining this season.

Having last hoisted the Astor Cup in 2020, the 44-year-old Dixon continues to chase his record-tying seventh championship.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Scott Dixon's IndyCar title hopes disappear in Lap 1 Portland crash