Devlin DeFrancesco’s return to the NTT IndyCar Series with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing in the No. 30 Honda will feature the return of sponsor EVTEC Group. The European producer of automotive assemblies and components was featured on the …
Devlin DeFrancesco’s return to the NTT IndyCar Series with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing in the No. 30 Honda will feature the return of sponsor EVTEC Group.
The European producer of automotive assemblies and components was featured on the Italian-Canadian driver’s previous IndyCar entry at Andretti Global and will take the role of primary sponsor for eight races — almost half the season — starting with Barber Motorsports Park, then the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, the Indianapolis 500, the Detroit Grand Prix, Mid-Ohio, the Portland Grand Prix, the Milwaukee Mile, and the season finale at Nashville Superspeedway.
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“We take pride in our efforts to help our partners grow their business and look forward to helping EVTEC grow their already impressive client list,” said RLL co-owner Bobby Rahal.
DeFrancesco, who completed two season with Andretti from 2022-2023, is part of a significant reboot for RLL, joining 2024 Indy NXT champion Louis Foster as newcomers alongside team veteran Graham Rahal.
The NTT IndyCar Series has an overabundance of high-caliber drivers who are signed or ready to step into the 27 full-time cars in 2025, but the same can’t be said for proven race engineers, who are among the most precious commodities within each …
The NTT IndyCar Series has an overabundance of high-caliber drivers who are signed or ready to step into the 27 full-time cars in 2025, but the same can’t be said for proven race engineers, who are among the most precious commodities within each program.
With turnkey race engineers in short supply, the hunt to find the right candidates is happening at Chip Ganassi Racing, which is looking for a race engineer to pair with sophomore Kyffin Simpson and work alongside the entries for Scott Dixon and Alex Palou, and at Juncos Hollinger Racing, which has a new race engineering vacancy to fill after Stephen Barker departed and is believed to have joined the new PREMA Racing outfit.
In light of the scarcity with those who are experienced with the unique IndyCar engineering demands posed by racing on ovals of three different sizes, plus road and street courses, teams in need of race engineers start by looking within the paddock for those who are available or wanting to make a move.
The next step is to look outside of IndyCar to IMSA, or Formula 1, or NASCAR, or the FIA WEC to find veterans, and if those explorations are unsuccessful, searching within the team to identify an assistant race engineer or performance engineer to promote is a common practice. The last step, which is a rarity in IndyCar, is to parse through the junior formulas — Indy NXT and Formula 2 — to take a chance on a rising engineering talent who lacks top-tier experience.
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At Ganassi, a range of changes, including the downsizing of five full-time IndyCar entries to three, the shuttering of its IMSA GTP program, creation of a new two-car Indy NXT program, and the signing of Meyer Shank Racing to provide technical support — including two race engineers — has shuffled its engineering group and left the defending series champions with an unforeseen race engineering void.
“We lost two senior engineers at the end of the season, which we didn’t expect,” Ganassi managing director Mike Hull told RACER. “And yes, we reduced our reduced our entries to three because of the charter system. But we’ve replaced it with Indy NXT and we’ve taken on the Meyer Shank program, which is supplying engineering support for those two entries. So we’ve actually increased ourselves a fair amount. So by losing two engineers, we’ve been scouring the marketplace globally to try to find senior engineers, a senior engineer, or maybe more than one, in this case, to protect ourselves going forward.”
What is Hull looking for in his preferred candidate?
“The kind of engineer that you would like to have, it would be terrific if they had IndyCar experience,” he said. “And it would be terrific, frankly, if they’ve at some point in their life – even as a young person – driven a race car, because I think that gives them a different perspective on what the driver really wants from the cockpit outward, rather than from the data stream inward to the cockpit. Those kinds of engineers are very, very difficult to find, and rightfully so.”
Unlike Ganassi, which has a specific space to fill, Juncos Hollinger has yet to decide its race engineering assignments for Conor Daly and Sting Ray Robb. Where the best available engineers tend to flock towards the Ganassis and Penskes and other title-winning teams, the up-and-coming teams who aren’t a threat to the big programs tend to attract older race engineers — the well-traveled types — or are willing to give newer talent a shot at helping them to escape the midfield or lower.
“The interesting bit with a smaller team is that typically your hunting ground is a Purdue, or any of the decent universities,” said Juncos Hollinger team principal Dave O’Neill. “We have a decent amount of young students within our business, but it comes with a lack of experience, but a lot of enthusiasm. And somewhere in between, you have to achieve a balance. Of course, the other bit you’re looking for is someone with the experience, who knows when not to panic. You want the youth and enthusiasm, but you also want the steady hand on the shoulder as well.
“With having a new team that’s effectively three years old, the difficult bit is having anyone there with some substance that’s, been around for a decent amount of time, so you have a limited amount of IP to draw from.”
For O’Neill, who joined Juncos Hollinger during the 2024 after a long career in Formula 1, IndyCar’s engineering challenges make his job in trying to recruit a new race engineer far more difficult than anything he faced in hiring for similar roles in F1.
“It’s difficult to pick people from other series because of the ovals,” he said. “This is new to me, because I’ve only done the ovals for a year, but it’s so complicated when it comes to getting it right the first time on an oval. A person who is new to oval engineering is going to have a hard time getting it right when they’ve never done it before, and that affects the entire team.
“If you can have stability within your engineering program, you start each weekend with a more of a level playing field. But you can’t always find that experienced person, and have to look inside to a junior engineer to bring up, or look to university, and just see who you can find that’s the right fit for your team. So we’re searching, and with a new car coming down the road, you’d like to have someone who can build with you and be part of the process of changing over to a new car and making the most out of it.”
Welcome to the RACER Mailbag. Questions for any of RACER’s writers can be sent to mailbag@racer.com. We love hearing your comments and opinions, but letters that include a question are more likely to be published. Questions received after 3pm ET …
Welcome to the RACER Mailbag. Questions for any of RACER’s writers can be sent to mailbag@racer.com. We love hearing your comments and opinions, but letters that include a question are more likely to be published. Questions received after 3pm ET each Monday will be saved for the following week.
Q: Will we ever see an IndyCar series race on the Chicago Street Course at Grant Park? The same street course that NASCAR races on in the summer?
Chris Fiegler, Latham, NY
MARSHALL PRUETT: No, not unless the city ditches NASCAR or vice versa, and the city chooses to engage IndyCar.
Q: I love the low, sleek, missile-like look of the Lolas and Reynards from the late 1990s and early 2000s. They just looked fast, even when standing still. The current DW12 lacks some of that look, as its side profile looks taller in the center. The tall center visually shortens the car and takes away much of the sleekness.
Part of that is due to the aeroscreen, which I would never dream of suggesting eliminating. However, for me, the biggest part of the tall center appearance is due to the camera pod atop the roll hoop. From the side profile, it looks a little like a snorkel and takes away any low, long, sleek car presence. The camera in the pod is great for the TV product and provides excellent shots of both the side-by-side racing action and cockpit activity, however, I would love to see that camera pod removed in favor of cameras integrated into the car’s lines. Maybe in the center of the roll hoop and/or within the top ring of the aeroscreen halo.
Have you heard any discussion or suggestion about integrated camera placement in the new car design?
Tim Hubbel, Gypsy, OK
MP: I haven’t, but I’ll ask.
Q: I read the Mailbag every week and it seems I am not the only one disappointed about the lack of IndyCar’s presence in video game form. I, like many of your readers, are casual gamers (been playing some sort of console racing game since I was 6, playing the Al Unser Jr racing game on the original NES). Through the years I have played many games, most currently Forza Motorsport on Xbox X.
Currently, IndyCar is not part of the Forza platform (or any other) but it used to be, along with the Long Beach street circuit. Bi-monthly, Forza issues a new track to go with its current selection of tracks. How great would it be if we could get IndyCar and Forza Motorsport to get together and get back into the gaming world? LBGP could be released just prior to the April race with the crapwagon DW12 gen-whatever-we’re-on-now, but it would be a great start. It would be a great way to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the race and seems almost too smart an idea to pass up.
They could even have a ‘beat the lap’-type challenge where gamers try to best a current drivers lap. Additionally, Forza already has a lot of the current tracks (IMS, Road America, Laguna, Mid-Ohio) so you could have an IndyCar mini-series.
Tom, Blue Bell, PA
MP: Yep, all kinds of things they could do. As Penske’s Mark Miles told me towards the end of the season, there’s nothing imminent. Hopefully that changes.
NASCAR’s going to be the only series that races past bars that serve Malort for the foreseeable future. Motorsport Images
Q: What is the status of Honda’s future in IndyCar? With Nissan and Honda joining together, will Honda leave Indy and have Nissan take its place?
David Tucker
MP: Honda’s supply contract runs through 2026. It will decide on whether it wants to stay within the next year. A planned merger with Nissan has been announced, which is different from an actual merger having taken place. It’s got to happen before they can make decisions on such things, if it’s even a consideration.
Q: In the previous Mailbag, you suggested allowing manufacturers to create styling options so that the cars were visually distinct.
How would what you’re proposing be different from the aero kits from the mid 2010s? Those brought visual differentiation between manufacturers. They were supposed to attract Boeing and other aerospace companies, but failed to do so.
I think the pitch sounds good now, but I also thought it sounded good then. No one seemed to like the aero kits then, and no one was sad when they went away.
Kyle
MP: That’s not true. I was sad when they went away. The 2015-2017 aero kits did offer some visual differentiation, but the rules were written to allow great freedom with downforce, which led to crazy explosions of wings upon wings, and in speedway form, super tiny wings. What didn’t happen was the creation of aero rules that were focused on styling variety, as I don’t think of crazy numbers of wings as being about styling.
Right now, there are two manufacturers, not five or 10, so it’s not an overly complex thing to create. Come up with between three-four styling options for manufacturers to choose from, but make those options a set package with items that are unique.
For example, if adding a shark fin to the engine cover is allowed, it can only be used by one manufacturer. And if they all want it, flip cons, or arm wrestle for it. But don’t let all of them use a shark fin because then we’re back to the same problem of all the cars looking alike.
The nose of an open-wheel car sets the tone for the rest of its looks. Create three or four options. Sidepods do the same from the side. Do the same there. And so on. This isn’t about performance. It’s about making a Chevy stand out from a Honda and a ??????? to stand out from a Chevy and Honda.
And like IMSA does with its GTP cars, take them to a wind tunnel, benchmark their downforce and drag and center of pressure and ride height figures and sensitivities, and make adjustments to make them as equal as possible.
Penske Entertainment CEO Mark Miles says positive talks continue to take place with its current NTT IndyCar Series engine partners and auto manufacturers who are curious to learn where the series is headed with its next engine formula. Having made a …
Penske Entertainment CEO Mark Miles says positive talks continue to take place with its current NTT IndyCar Series engine partners and auto manufacturers who are curious to learn where the series is headed with its next engine formula.
Having made a midseason conversion to hybridization in July of 2024, IndyCar will continue to race with small-displacement internal combustion engines (ICE) and some form of energy recovery system (ERS) when its new formula appears – as early as 2027 – and is working to retain Chevrolet and Honda beyond the end of their supply contracts.
Adding a third manufacturer to join Chevy and Honda, which would reduce their supply responsibilities and save a considerable amount in annual budget commitments, has been among the series greatest needs since Lotus departed after the 2012 season.
“I’d just say the for both of those populations, it’s very encouraging, both the extension of our existing partners, whose arrangements go through 2026, and the possibility of adding one or more new manufacturers,” Miles told RACER.
In order to move from interests expressed by its current manufacturers and others who might join into something more formal, Penske Entertainment will need to solidify its ICE and ERS formulas. Once it has fixed and tangible plans to present, Chevy, Honda, and more car companies will have the information required to make official decisions on whether they will be part of IndyCar’s future.
“Just as there is work being done for Honda and Chevy, there’s serious interest on the part of prospective newcomers that are paying close attention and doing all you’d expect them to do to understand the costs and their ability to be competitive,” Miles said. “It’s all related.”
IndyCar has used a 2.2-liter turbocharged V6 formula since 2012 and added a custom ERS package last year, done in partnership with Chevy and Honda, which uses primary energy storage and deployment componentry from Skeleton and Empel.
I’ve been fan of IndyCar racing since I was nine years old. Viewing the 1964 Indy 500 live on a closed circuit black and white TV broadcast in a theater with hundreds of die-hard racing fans delivered an irresistible emotional gravity that hooked me …
I’ve been fan of IndyCar racing since I was nine years old. Viewing the 1964 Indy 500 live on a closed circuit black and white TV broadcast in a theater with hundreds of die-hard racing fans delivered an irresistible emotional gravity that hooked me then and has held me ever since. During the 22,136 days since then, I’ve watched this sport repeatedly soar to triumphant highs and then suffer through some excruciatingly self-inflicted destructive lows.
Racing became my lifelong passion, my way of life and my profession. I began working full-time in racing media during the first week of January in 1975. Since then, I’ve been fortunate to know most of the people who have managed — or sometimes mismanaged — the sport of IndyCar racing. And if there’s one key lesson that I’ve learned it’s this: keeping IndyCar racing stable, healthy, growing and thriving is anything but easy.
This was particularly evident during the past 30 years of the sport, that have been predominantly turbulent and persistently disorienting and disheartening to many lifelong Indy 500 and IndyCar racing fans like me, who grew up when the Indy 500 and IndyCar racing was unquestionably America’s premier form of motorsport. The hard truth is that division, identity confusion, negative off-track storylines, and progressive diminishment of the technical diversity in the cars and engines have muted the allure of a sport that once set the pace for audience scale and commercial energy. Many of us older IndyCar fans eventually found other things to care about while some of us focused instead on conveying displeasure with the sport’s direction.
Another hard reality is that there simply weren’t enough new fans being exposed to IndyCar racing, and subsequently engaging in it to create fresh, positive cultural energy emanating from the sport. This has unfortunately continued to be the case during the first five years of this decade, despite Roger Penske’s welcome acquisition of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the NTT IndyCar Series in 2019, that was unfortunately timed on the eve of the global COVID 19 pandemic. Since then, IndyCar’s progress has been steady but slow, which is not the Penske way. So, the complaining about IndyCar’s leadership team in RACER.com’s comment sections, in RACER’s social media channels and in the RACER Mailbag has become a digital bloodsport that metaphorically eclipses the whine of a twin-turbo 2.2-liter V6 at 12,000 rpm.
But I believe that is about to change because 2025 feels to me like a true turning point year for the NTT IndyCar Series. The new FOX all-network broadcast deal isn’t just a TV contract; it’s a huge and potentially game-changing opportunity to reconnect IndyCar racing with mainstream America. It is also an encouraging external validation of the true potential of the Indy 500 and NTT IndyCar Series to create emotional meaning that can attract audiences.
Securing the future of Long Beach as an IndyCar venue is one key to providing a stable platform for long-term growth. Michael Levitt/Motorsport Images
Equally significant are Penske Entertainment’s recent acquisition of the Long Beach Grand Prix Association and the announcement of the upcoming Arlington Grand Prix in 2026. These moves aren’t just about preserving or adding races to the NTT IndyCar Series schedule — they’re about ensuring stability and signaling a commitment to building the series through modern lifestyle-oriented event weekends that can accelerate growth and build cultural relevance that will attract younger fans to the series. These events also serve as fan data capture opportunities outside of Indiana and Detroit that will directly connect Penske Entertainment to new fans, as well as provide insight into what they like and don’t like about the IndyCar fan experience, that will shape the future of the NTT IndyCar Series.
The Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach, the series’ second-most popular event, will celebrate its 50th anniversary this year. I’ve been fortunate to have attended every Long Beach GP race weekend since the inaugural SCCA Formula 5000 event in 1975. I was there when the CART PPG IndyCar Series replaced Formula 1 as the headline show in 1984, and it soon became a defining element in the sport’s uniquely diverse schedule, first for CART, then ChampCar and now IndyCar. This also ensured IndyCar’s continual presence in the USA’s second largest Designated Market Area (DMA). The Arlington Grand Prix represents transformational growth potential in the fourth-largest U.S. DMA, through an exciting partnership between Penske Entertainment and Jerry Jones’ Dallas Cowboys organization. These moves show that IndyCar isn’t just reacting to challenges — it’s actively building the foundation for a brighter future.
Penske Entertainment CEO Mark Miles and IndyCar President Jay Frye deserve credit for the good things that are now happening for IndyCar. Steering a ship this big, with so many vocal stakeholders and so much history, takes a steady hand and a thick skin. Despite some missteps — such as the delayed, but ultimately successful introduction of the hybrid package in mid-2024, and the slow reveal of a clear vision for the series’ next engine and chassis formula in 2027 — their leadership has kept the series moving forward.
Ultimately it is Roger Penske who now owns this sport that defines his personal identity and the competitive spirit of his $39 billion business empire. Those critical of Penske cannot deny that the Indy 500 and the NTT IndyCar Series are clearly his lifelong passion. So, as these recent developments illustrate, Roger always plays to win. History shows us that he’s usually several laps ahead of the competition in his strategic thinking, We also should appreciate his obvious urgency to “get it done,” given that he will celebrate his 88th birthday on Feb. 20, so I like his chances in this 115-year race to what’s next,
The intention of Penske Entertainment is clear to many who make the decisions to invest in the sport: They know Roger Penske’s goal for IndyCar is to make it better by every measure, by doing what it takes to reposition, redefine and re-energize the sport at every touchpoint. These partners likely appreciate the reasons why this has been a challenging period for IndyCar racing, but they also understand that this is the sport’s golden opportunity to reset, and that the commitment is there to succeed.
Meyer Shank Racing co-owner Michael Shank is wondering whether it’s time for his NTT IndyCar Series team to take a page from NASCAR programs and begin flying in specialist pit crews to go over the wall and handle the servicing of their cars in …
Meyer Shank Racing co-owner Michael Shank is wondering whether it’s time for his NTT IndyCar Series team to take a page from NASCAR programs and begin flying in specialist pit crews to go over the wall and handle the servicing of their cars in competition.
It’s a practice that’s customary in stock car racing, where former college and professional athletes are recruited to perform the fastest possible tire changes and refueling. It also owns a piece of Indianapolis 500 history, minus the athletic side, in 1965 when Lotus brought in the Wood Brothers’ NASCAR pit crew to bring its unique skills to servicing Jimmy Clark’s car on the way to reaching victory lane.
Today, and with the ever-shrinking separation between IndyCar teams, Shank thinks the practice of asking each car’s mechanics to pull double duty as its pit crew might be ready for a change.
“A thing that I think is coming is professional pit crews,” Shank told RACER. “It’s trying to creep in. Now I’m trying to figure out ways to pay for it. As an example, instead of paying a driver all the money you have left, maybe some of that budget could go towards a pro-spec pit crew that come in.
“I think that’s definitely on its way in, and we’re talking about D1, D2, D3 athletes that are super competitive and make a decent living doing other things but also come in on the weekends. But we’re not there yet though. We’re looking at it. There’s already teams doing a couple of positions that way, but not all of them. But I think it’s going more in that direction over the next year or two.”
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During most IndyCar pit stops, which last approximately eight seconds, it takes longer for the refueler to fill the car’s 17.5-gallon fuel tank than it does for the four tire changers to complete their jobs. On the surface, that dynamic alone would seemingly invalidate any needs for fly-in pit crews. But the tactic of doing “short fills,” the timed refuelings where the tank isn’t filled to capacity and the car is sent once the tire changes are finished — done to eke out an advantage over teams who’ve elected to fill their tanks — to gain positions is becoming more popular in IndyCar.
In that strategical play, the speed of the tire changers and the fast and consistent connecting of the fuel probe to the car has a big impact on how long the car sits in a stationary position. If a dedicated pit crew can produce stops that are a few tenths of a second faster than traditional crews, Shank sees it as a worthy expense.
“Short fills are one thing, and also, when the cars on the ground, it fuels quicker,” he said. “Now, we’re talking slight improvements, like half-a-tenth here, but gravity is our king, right? The quicker the tires are done and the car is on the ground, the quicker the fuel goes, so you want every opportunity to make up a tenth or two and beat you out by a nose. If you can do that, then the whole effort put in to hiring these type of guys worked, as far as I’m concerned.”
When every fraction of a second counts. Michael Levitt/Motorsport Images
Reducing the physical demands on MSR’s full-time crews who look after the Nos. 60 and 66 Hondas, who would handle all aspects of preparing and running the cars, minus going over the wall to service the machines on race day, is another meaningful area under consideration.
“It’s just a lot to put on these guys as the schedule gets tighter and busier,” Shank added. “We ask them for perfection on the cars with car preparation, and then ask for perfection on pit lane performance, right? That’s just a lot to ask of anybody.”
But as Shank found while floating the idea of fly-in pit crews to his team, there’s one factor to contemplate that has nothing to do with speed and consistency.
“There’s two sides to that coin that I’m learning as we try to figure out if this is the right thing to do,” he said. “One side is a lot of the guys — I would say, 70 percent of the people that pit the car — do it because they love it, even though it’s more work for them. They would truly miss that side of it, so you’ve got to weigh that against pure performance. Can we truly make a consistent gain compared to guys that are doing the equivalent to playing both sides of the ball?
“That’s what this is, right? We’re asking them to do all that at a super high-level of execution all weekend with preparing and running the cars in all the sessions, and then at the end, when everybody is the most worn out, to go out there and do the same high level with pit stops. And no joke, there’s all kinds of amazing crews who do it and have done it for a lot longer than I’ve been here, including our own. But what if we could help ourselves by doing it a different way? It’s going to be a delicate rope to walk, in my mind, that’s for sure.”
Sam Schmidt and Ric Peterson have departed the Arrow McLaren team after McLaren Racing completed its buyout of the NTT IndyCar Series outfit. The completion of the purchase follows McLaren’s 75-percent acquisition of the team in 2021. The …
Sam Schmidt and Ric Peterson have departed the Arrow McLaren team after McLaren Racing completed its buyout of the NTT IndyCar Series outfit.
The completion of the purchase follows McLaren’s 75-percent acquisition of the team in 2021. The organization was founded by Schmidt in 2001 as Sam Schmidt Motorsports and added Peterson as co-owner in 2013 under the Schmidt Peterson Hamilton Motorsports banner, which included former Schmidt driver Davey Hamilton who brought sponsorship from Hewlett-Packard.
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Rebranded as Schmidt Peterson Motorsports in 2014 with Schmidt, the former Indy Racing League driver and Peterson, the Canadian transportation magnate, in charge of the business, the duo progressively ceded their daily oversight of the team after McLaren entered the picture and shifted the name from Arrow McLaren SP to Arrow McLaren in 2023.
With the team he built as the first major endeavor after suffering a life-altering crash in IndyCar testing now wholly owned by McLaren, Schmidt exits with mixed feelings.
“Stepping away from my ownership role with Arrow McLaren is bittersweet,” he said. “This team has been my life’s work, growing from a dream into a competitor at the highest level. I’m endlessly grateful to the drivers, team members, partners and fans who made it all possible, and to McLaren for elevating the team’s potential. While I’m stepping back from ownership, my heart will always be with this team, and I’ll be cheering for its continued success every step of the way.”
Peterson added, “Since I joined Sam as co-owner in 2013, it’s been rewarding to see this team evolve. We welcomed Arrow as title partner in 2019, we joined forces with McLaren in 2021, we became a three-car NTT IndyCar Series team in 2023, and we celebrated many poles, podiums and wins in Indy Lights and IndyCar throughout those years. This team has a strong foundation for success, and Sam and I are proud of where we leave it.”
McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown recently appointed IndyCar champion and Indy 500 winner Tony Kanaan as team principal to lead Arrow McLaren into the future.
“This is an exciting step for McLaren Racing as we grow and strengthen our presence in North America, which is a very important market for our team and our fans,” Brown said. “Sam Schmidt and Ric Peterson have been great partners and co-owners, and I want to thank them as we continue to build what they started many years ago, and that is a championship caliber NTT IndyCar Series team.”
The Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course has shared images of its property-wide renovations ahead of the new season. As RACER recently documented, fresh paving throughout the facility, a reshaping of Turn 4 and the filling of its runoff area, and new fencing …
The Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course has shared images of its property-wide renovations ahead of the new season.
As RACER recently documented, fresh paving throughout the facility, a reshaping of Turn 4 and the filling of its runoff area, and new fencing was installed at the track owned by Green Savoree Race Promotions.
“We’d like to thank all our partners – Arcadis, Dallara, Kokosing Construction, Kokosing Materials and our own track operations team – for their expertise and excellent work,” said GSRP co-owner Kevin Savoree.
The new-look Turn 4. Image by Mid-Ohio
“Plus, The National Bank of Indianapolis provided financial services for this extensive capital project. We look forward to welcoming competitors and fans back to the property in the spring!”
According to GSRP, “Another phase of the work this offseason was the replacement of concrete barrier blocks with 5,300 feet of guardrail and new fencing around the track. Areas include the front straight on driver’s right, the back straight on both sides, and then the Turn 4 area including driver’s right through the Esses segment.
“Additionally, Kokosing repaved 4,920 linear feet equating to 201,000 square feet of the facility’s access and service roads which are utilized by spectators and competitors. The new surfaces include the road that leads through the main spectator gate (Gate 1) off of Steam Corners Road and enters north through the property toward the paddock areas and infield. The access road between the middle and upper paddocks was also repaved, in addition to the false grid road leading onto the track near the last turn, and pavement around the Mid-Ohio Operations Building which is often used during non-spectator racing activities.”
New fencing along the front straight. Image by Mid-Ohio
Project Facts and Figures
The renovations included:
* Five new catch basins
* 520 linear feet of track paving
* 1,370 feet of new drainage pipes, ranging from 4-inch to 24-inch diameter
* 1,600 tons of millings
* 1,875 loads of material hauled by 24 trucks
* 4,900 tons of asphalt
* 15,500 cubic yards of fill material
* 500 concrete blocks repurposed, originally used at the IMSA events in downtown Columbus, Ohio (held in 1985-1988)
The longstanding use of magnesium wheels could change in 2026 or 2027. The metal, which has been a common choice for decades in IndyCar due to its lightweight property, is becoming increasingly hard to acquire from vendors who are capable of doing …
The longstanding use of magnesium wheels could change in 2026 or 2027.
The metal, which has been a common choice for decades in IndyCar due to its lightweight property, is becoming increasingly hard to acquire from vendors who are capable of doing the large castings required to create the specialized racing wheels.
As a results of the scarcity, RACER has learned the NTT IndyCar Series is in talks with its teams to make a switch to aluminum wheels after next season, which is a more common material that is readily cast or forged in high volumes.
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Unique to IndyCar, teams have amassed vast stockpiles of magnesium ‘aero’ wheels that feature a large lip on the front wheels that assist in smoothing airflow as it moves across the surface of the wheels and onto the back of the cars. Many of those magnesium aero wheels have been in use for quite some time, and also suffer from age-related corrosion, which take them out of competition.
O.Z. Racing, which has served as the most popular vendor for magnesium IndyCar aero wheels, is understood to be in discussions with the series to manufacture wheels in the same size — essentially identical to the magnesium units — in aluminum, and if it’s approved, a wholesale changeover could be required.
RACER understands the final specs for the aluminum wheels have not been set, but achieving a similar weight to the magnesium wheels is said to be a priority, and due to the use of a less exotic metal, costs would come down with each set.
At present, new magnesium wheels cost $1650 apiece — front or rear — and $6600 for a complete set. In moving to aluminum, a price reduction in the range of $750 or more for each set is possible.
On average with the 27 full-time IndyCar entries, teams start each season with 10-12 sets per car (40-48 wheels), and as crashes happen and wheels are destroyed, most teams ensure they maintain at least 10 sets per car to complete the year.
Welcome to the RACER Mailbag. Questions for any of RACER’s writers can be sent to mailbag@racer.com. We love hearing your comments and opinions, but letters that include a question are more likely to be published. Questions received after 3pm ET …
Welcome to the RACER Mailbag. Questions for any of RACER’s writers can be sent to mailbag@racer.com. We love hearing your comments and opinions, but letters that include a question are more likely to be published. Questions received after 3pm ET each Monday will be saved for the following week.
Q: For decades, car design was all about speed. Sometime in the mid to late ’90s, IndyCar evolution became more about safety, reliability, and cost control. Huge gains were made in these areas, but at the expense of 25-30 years of incremental speed evolution.
What would the cars look like today if they would have been allowed to continually evolve through annual engineering and design advancements meant primarily to gain competitive speed advantages? In a perfect world, the anticipated 2027 car design should make up for as much of this gap as possible, at least aerodynamically. That’s the car I’d like to see considered, imagined, designed, tested, and raced.
Greg K.
MARSHALL PRUETT: I’m with you, Greg. Let’s do a deep dive to start the new year.
For most of IndyCar’s 100-plus years of existence, the cars and all of the innovations and unique ideas they were conceived from held the interest of its fans. There was no separation of the drivers and their cars; curiosity for what made the drivers so brave and skilled carried over to the cars and curiosities about the unique or boundary-pushing concepts they contained.
Unlike a football or basketball, the main tool we use to play our sport constantly changed and evolved, and the interaction between our athletes and the dynamic machines they strapped into was a big part of the intrigue.
Even the post-WWII “junk” formula and the roadster era that followed, which mostly went against the high-tech grain, were beautiful, or offered interesting takes on the same basic chassis layout and Offy engine package. A few cool and new things emerged like a turbodiesel polesitter at Indy and the SUMAR Streamliner, which fully encapsulated the driver and had four fenders, but they were outliers. Nonetheless, the cars were still a huge part of the intrigue and attraction.
And then we had IndyCar’s wildest creative decade in the 1960s when wings and turbocharging arrived, which carried into the 1970s, and even with the arrival of mass-produced off-the-shelf cars from March and Lola in the 1980s, there was enough freedom and variety to make the technological side interesting for fans.
More mass production came in the 1990s as Reynard joined in, and it was with the engines where the greatest variety was found, and huge power as well. That bled into the early 2000s and peaked with Gil de Ferran’s record qualifying run of 241.428mph at Fontana in 2001, and then it soon settled as Champ Car became a de facto Lola-Cosworth formula while the Indy Racing League went full spec on the chassis side starting in 1997 with Dallara and GForce, and two types of engines in Oldsmobile and Nissan.
The Champ Car Lolas (with the odd Reynard thrown in) were still super-fast, and there were plenty of tiny improvements made on the chassis and aero side, but they weren’t things that the average fan would notice, and all the engines were supplied by Cosworth, and together, it led to a gradual loss of caring about the technology side.
That kind of care was surrendered even earlier with the IRL on its debut in 1996, with possible exception for the monster Menard Buick V6 power that was being made. But the cars, as a whole, became spec tools by 1997 that not only looked the same, but by rule, could not be modified.
Will the U.S. open-wheel history books forever record de Ferran’s record-breaking lap at Fontana as the high water mark for cool cars that went really fast? Michael Levitt/Motorsport Images
So with both IndyCar series locked into a spec or spec-ish look and sound, it’s easy to understand how and why, after nearly a century of awesome and vibrant cars being a central part of an IndyCar follower’s fanhood, that elevated degree of vehicular interest – of wanting to know about the finer details – started to die on slightly different IRL and Champ Car timelines.
Once both series stripped the personality out of their formulas to present a cheaper, generic product, the desire to know all about those cars largely died.
Today, they’re just tools where the only innovations are found inside the dampers, which fans can’t see and don’t care about. And inside the engines, which follow the same can’t see/don’t care theme, because IndyCar’s engine suppliers keep everything they do under lock and key and don’t welcome fans into that world.
Hybridization, the newest tech in the cars, has been relatively open for sharing, and some folks have shown an interest, but it, too, is spec, which makes it a lot like the cars: Something cool to process and learn about when it’s new, but after a short period, you’ve learned what there is to know or grown accustomed to seeing the same old thing, and the curiosity is lost.
Also, hybridization hasn’t been embraced by a decent amount of fans, along with some team owners and drivers. So while the DW12s have cutting-edge energy recovery technology inside the bellhousings, I’ve seen more “kill it with fire” reactions than, “wow, that’s amazing, tell me all about it.”
Racing’s origins are an offshoot of human creativity. One person’s big ideas pitted against the next person’s grand ideas. It’s human expression in its coolest vehicular arena. But when we allow ourselves to kill that creativity and expression, we can’t be surprised when racing series that stifle creativity also end up stifling their popularity.
The easy argument against embracing creativity is costs, but I’ve never known a time where racing wasn’t insanely expensive. I don’t want to blow up IndyCar by having wide-open technological freedom, but I also don’t want the costs-first side to win and give us another decade or more of good-but-underwhelming growth with a car – the core of our sport – that does nothing to spike new interest. Not while IndyCar is living deep in NASCAR’s shadow, and in the widening shadow cast by F1.
There can be a middle ground allowing human creativity back into IndyCar — beyond the effing dampers — without breaking the bank. Pick a region or two on the cars where teams can play with bodywork, internal aerodynamics, or suspension technology… and seek sponsors and corporate partners to be involved in those areas to enrich their bank accounts.
Come up with styling options for the engine suppliers to use to make it easier to tell a Chevy from a Honda from a Toyota/Dodge/whatever, to whatever degree is possible — outright stealing what IMSA has done with its manufacturer GTP styling requirements.
Identify areas in the electronics, or software/apps where teams and manufacturers can apply their expertise and give them a six-month window of exclusivity before having to publish those solutions. Many folks love seeing what Apple/Google/Samsung/etc. come up with for phone/tablet creations and app developments; why not tap into that by pulling those folks and fans and companies into IndyCar with the same creative process? Is there a Chevy/Honda/whoever head-up display that can be integrated into the cockpit?
How about those same, but custom phone/tablet solutions in the cockpit instead of a spec steering wheel that delivers the display on a spec LCD screen? Imagine big and small tech companies having a green light to get involved with teams — to the teams’ enrichment — and use the cockpits as tech labs and promotional tools.
Instead of endless worrying about costs and keeping creativity and innovation to a minimum out of fear for runaway budgets, how about opening up tech areas and ideas where IndyCar teams can actually profit and become wealthier through bringing all manner of sponsor/partner deals into the paddock?
Here’s Jarno Trulli looking at a boat. Motorsport Images
An example: As we’ve had in IMSA and the WEC for many years, I’ve heard IndyCar is considering a rear-view video camera system for the next car. In sports cars, the first systems were simple bullet cameras pointing out from the bumper that fed a little monitor on the dash, but they’ve become pretty serious, with some using lidar and software that point to which side an approaching car is trying to make a pass.
In keeping with how IndyCar has done things for decades, it will find a single vendor, sign that vendor as the spec supplier, make a modest profit on each sale, and that’s the end of it. Everybody must use the new rear-facing camera and cockpit monitor, pay a set price, and it’s installed and forgotten. It’s a broken way of thinking that kills business and innovation.
No wonder so many teams are having to take on investors or sign more paying drivers just to stay alive.
Regarding how I hope Penske Entertainment approaches this hypothetical rearview camera situation, it will set the technical specification for a rear camera system, identify a spec vendor that can be used, if desired, but leave it open for teams to seek their own vendors. Hey, Sony, or Nikon, or Apple/Google/Samsung/Intel/Bosch/LG/Philips/Toshiba/whoever, let’s do some cool things together in creating a solution, have you become an associate sponsor, and use our team’s cars as a rolling laboratory and promotions machine for this item, and maybe other things you make as well.
Imagine the advertising possibilities with those big companies, using their IndyCar involvement as part of their annual marketing campaigns. It’s everything we dream of, and would also enrich FOX, racetracks with banners and onsite activations, and through digital advertising.
IndyCar can change its future if it’s willing to stop doing dumb things like making almost everything spec. From Hisense to Sharp to JVC to Vivo to Motorola, to all of the big names like Apple and Google, they are barred from doing anything tech-related in IndyCar. Think of all the significant tech brands you know of, or whose products you own, and of all the up-and-coming firms in Silicon Valley and other tech-rich regions, and they can’t make a single thing to be used in IndyCar. By IndyCar’s choice.
(And yes, I realize there are other series who do the same dumb thing, but the question was about IndyCar. And also, the spec rules we have today were written long before Penske Entertainment bought the series or IndyCar’s entire operations and tech department led by Jay Frye were hired.)
Think small and spec, and get small results, which is what has plagued IndyCar — traced back to the IRL and Champ Car — for longer than some of its newest fans have been alive. Or have some balls, and refuse to be driven by fear, and make smart business decisions that benefit the teams.
Every time a decision is made to sign a spec deal, it’s the series that profits and the teams who are further strangled in some financial way. Penske Entertainment, led by Roger Penske — among the greatest business people this sport has known — has its first chance, through bringing a new car to market with Dallara, to show his business expertise by removing the word “spec” from a range of areas on the car.
Opening up big and new and real business opportunities for the paddock by breaking decades of spec thinking is critical.
And if the whole damn thing is another spec car from nose to tail that continues to handcuff IndyCar’s teams from seeking and finding new technology sponsors and partners, I’ll have to question why the series signed its entrants up for another decade of financial struggles.
“Spec” has been the noose IndyCar willingly places around the neck of its teams and watches as they complain about struggling to breathe. It’s time for a rethink on the ways and places where open competition can make IndyCar better, more interesting, and stoke new business development.
Let the technology world — aerospace, aviation, automotive, electronics, and so on — in and let their collective infusion of money and engineering and creativity lift IndyCar to heights some of us once enjoyed before the word spec started choking the life out of the series.
