The final laps of IndyCar action have been turned for 2024 with a two-car test featuring Dale Coyne Racing’s Toby Sowery and Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing with Louis Foster at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca on Wednesday. It marked the last on-track outing for the NTT IndyCar Series before the new year arrives.
Among the pair of Britons, Foster, the reigning Indy NXT champion, set the unofficial best time at 1m10.198s in the No. 45 RLL Honda, doing so on his 85th of 89 laps. Sowery was the most active, making up for a gremlin-filled November test at The Thermal Club where vehicular issues kept the NXT race winner in the paddock for most of the visit.
At Laguna Seca, Sowery completed 130 laps of the 2.2-mile road course, with his best of 1m10.409s coming on the 104th tour.
“There was obviously a lot of things that we didn’t get to test for at Thermal, so this test was about completing everything that we had lined up there, and looking at the lap count, we made up for that,” Sowery told RACER. “It was a strong test for us, and we didn’t go there specifically chasing pace. As you know, you can quite often end up chasing your tail when it comes to that, and the track was a mile off of what it should be in terms of race weekend pace. So we ticked a lot of boxes, spent a lot of time in the car, did a lot of laps, but everything productive and I think we learned quite a lot with the things that we threw at the car.”
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Sowery made three starts for Coyne across Mid-Ohio, Toronto and Portland, with a best finish of 13th, which equaled the top result for DCR in 2024. The 28-year-old hopes to find enough funding to return with Coyne in a full-time capacity.
“Opportunities don’t come about too often in IndyCar, so any opportunity that we get is one that we’re going to take, so when Dale reached out to test for him, obviously we couldn’t say no,” Sowery said. “It’s taking every opportunity that we get. And obviously the relationship between myself and the team is very strong and growing at a good solid rate. There’s two sides to the sport: There’s the driving, and then there’s the business side.
“There’s still a lot of work in progress behind the scenes to make it a full-time gig, and I’m thankful for the opportunity that Dale gave us to start the career journey for myself in IndyCar. These tests are very valuable for both the teams that get the opportunities and the drivers with lesser amounts of seat time. So it’s been fantastic for me, no pressure, and we’re continuing to work on making this a regular thing.”