Filling the most recent field of 33 was a prolonged and painful affair that left the 2022 edition of the Indianapolis 500 with 32 entries — one shy of a full grid — until days before official practice began at the Speedway.
Thanks to a consortium of willing parties that included the NTT IndyCar Series, A.J. Foyt Racing, DragonSpeed, Cusick Motorsports, Team Chevy, Team Penske, and Andretti Autosport, among others, the No. 25 entry for Stefan Wilson was quickly assembled in Gasoline Alley in order to give the great race 11 complete rows of three.
With the dramas of last May in mind, there’s no need to worry about filling the grid as 33 entries are firmly in place. In fact, of those 33, only one awaits the public confirmation of its driver, and as RACER has learned, a few drivers who held out hope of landing that 33rd seat were informed at the opening IndyCar round at St. Petersburg that the opportunity was no longer available.
At present, Team Chevy and its partners at Ilmor Engineering have 16 entries on their roster and Honda Performance Development has 17. RACER understands HPD’s 17th engine lease assigned to Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing for Katherine Legge is its last, leaving Chevy to handle any entries that might emerge to take the field to 34 or beyond.
Although it won’t be a surprise if the 107th edition of the Indy 500 hold steady goes with 33 car and driver combos, two teams stand out as possibilities to introduce bumping to the event.
The first, which has a long history of adding an extra car or two to the entry list, is A.J. Foyt Racing. Set with two full-time cars for Santino Ferrucci and rookie Benjamin Pedersen, the team is actively searching for primary sponsors for both entries, and as team president Larry Foyt recently told RACER, if they’re successful in that sponsorship hunt, it would create a need to run a third car at Indy to represent longtime partner ABC Supply. If the team is unable to acquire primary sponsors ahead of May, one of its drivers will carry ABC’s colors and the team will stick with two cars.
After Foyt, the other team that’s been mentioned on a regular basis as having an interest in expanding the Indy 500 entry list is Abel Motorsports. The Indy NXT team was actually spoken of last year as wanting to take part in the great race, and whether it happens in 2023 or soon after, the Kentucky-based Abel family is destined for the big series.
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Foyt and Abel aren’t the only options to push the list of qualifiers to at least 34, but at the moment, they are among the best options to deliver as both have the assets and the means to make it happen. Paretta Autosport team owner Beth Paretta is also searching for opportunities to make a return to the Indy 500 where her team got its start in 2021.
Provisional 107th Indy 500 entry list
| 1 | A.J. Foyt Racing | Santino Ferrucci | Chevy | ||
| 2 | A.J. Foyt Racing | Benjamin Pedersen | Chevy | ||
| 3 | Andretti Autosport | Colton Herta | Honda | ||
| 4 | Andretti Autosport | Romain Grosjean | Honda | ||
| 5 | Andretti Autosport | Devlin DeFrancesco | Honda | ||
| 6 | Andretti Autosport | Kyle Kirkwood | Honda | ||
| 7 | Andretti Autosport | Marco Andretti | Honda | ||
| 8 | Arrow McLaren SP | Pato O’Ward | Chevy | ||
| 9 | Arrow McLaren SP | Felix Rosenqvist | Chevy | ||
| 10 | Arrow McLaren SP | Alexander Rossi | Chevy | ||
| 11 | Arrow McLaren SP | Tony Kanaan | Chevy | ||
| 12 | Chip Ganassi Racing | Scott Dixon | Honda | ||
| 13 | Chip Ganassi Racing | Alex Palou | Honda | ||
| 14 | Chip Ganassi Racing | Marcus Ericsson | Honda | ||
| 15 | Chip Ganassi Racing | Takuma Sato | Honda | ||
| 16 | Dale Coyne Racing | David Malukas | Honda | ||
| 17 | Dale Coyne Racing | Sting Ray Robb | Honda | ||
| 18 | Dreyer & Reinbold Racing | Stefan Wilson | Chevy | ||
| 19 | Dreyer & Reinbold Racing | TBD | Chevy | ||
| 20 | Ed Carpenter Racing | Rinus VeeKay | Chevy | ||
| 21 | Ed Carpenter Racing | Conor Daly | Chevy | ||
| 22 | Ed Carpenter Racing | Ed Carpenter | Chevy | ||
| 23 | Juncos Hollinger Racing | Callum Ilott | Chevy | ||
| 24 | Juncos Hollinger Racing | Agustin Canapino | Chevy | ||
| 25 | Meyer Shank Racing | Helio Castroneves | Honda | ||
| 26 | Meyer Shank Racing | Simon Pagenaud | Honda | ||
| 27 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan | Graham Rahal | Honda | ||
| 28 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan | Christian Lundgaard | Honda | ||
| 29 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan | Jack Harvey | Honda | ||
| 30 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan | Katherine Legge | Honda | ||
| 31 | Team Penske | Will Power | Chevy | ||
| 32 | Team Penske | Josef Newgarden | Chevy | ||
| 33 | Team Penske | Scott McLaughlin | Chevy |