New Zealand IndyCar star Scott Dixon is chasing a fifth championship at the season finale California.

Scott Dixon is desperate for a fifth IndyCar title, saying it would rank at the top of his career.

Dixon chases his dream on Monday (NZT) in the season-finale at Sonoma in northern California.

The table-topping Kiwi takes a 29-point lead into the last race ahead of American rival Alexander Rossi.

GETTY IMAGES IndyCar series leader Scott Dixon has had three wins in a consistent year but it's the championship he wants "real bad".

But with double points on offer, he's vulnerable and even Will Power (Australia) and Josef Newgarden (US) could mathematically take the title if disaster hit Dixon and Rossi on the twisting and hilly course.

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Asked how badly he wants to win this title to add to his successes in 2003, 2008, 2013 and 2015, the 38-year-old told IndyCar.com: "Yeah, real bad, real bad."

GETTY IMAGES Scott Dixon's distinctive blue and orange Chip Ganassi Racing Honda has set the pace in the 2018 IndyCar cseries.

Dixon is already a legend in this class and a fifth title would rank him behind only the great AJ Foyt who won seven.

Dixon has won 44 races, including the 2008 Indy 500 and ranks third in IndyCar history for race victories. But he reckons nothing might match nailing a fifth championship.

"It's right up at the top. That's what we've got right in front of us right now, so that's what we're after," he said.

Dixon likes that he controls his own destiny at Sonoma. Win and the title is his. If Rossi were to win the race, Dixon would have to finish in second place to still win the title. Things would be closer if the pair were to finish further down in the top 10.

Rossi had been making serious inroads into Dixon's seemingly impregnable lead until the penultimate race in Portland last week where the Kiwi somehow survived a first lap tangle and rebounded to finish fifth while Rossi struggled to eighth.

Dixon admits he would like to be better off in terms of a points lead but he hasn't forgotten how it could have all disappeared at Portland.

"The best would be going in with about a 106-point lead," Dixon laughed before the sobering memories of last week.

"Hey, we got super lucky (at Portland). You got to take those days. We've been on the other side of it before. Some situations we've lost championships like that, too. It sucks when you're on the other side.

"Maybe it happens to us at Sonoma. We hope it doesn't, but it has full potential. We'll go there, we'll try to have the fastest car we can prepare, qualify where we can, put our heads down. That's what we can do."

Dixon has reason to be fatalistic. In 2007 he lost the championship when he ran out of fuel on the last lap of the last race and gifted Dario Franchetti the title.

Rossi is taking a similar attitude to Sonoma as he chases his first championship.

"If it's meant to be, it's meant to be. Otherwise, you'll finish second," he said, stating the obvious.

There has been little to separate the two this year.

Dixon has three wins and has finished sixth or better in 14 races of 16 races.

Rossi also has three victories as well as a second and three thirds. He has finished ninth or better in 13 races.

They have even been compared because of their low-key persona.

Rossi takes any comparison to Dixon as a huge compliment.

"I think every IndyCar driver tries to emulate Scott because of what he's accomplished and what he's capable of. I don't think being compared to Scott in any way is a bad thing," Rossi told IndyCar.com.