Q: I remember a Mailbag a few years back when Robin mentioned he was trying to convince A.J. to hire Kyle Larson while he was on hiatus from NASCAR. Do you know if Larson was ever in any serious talks with an IndyCar team prior to last May’s 500?
Ben, CA
MP: Not that I’m aware of.
Q: Social media discussion has been happening about the lack of a scoreboard at Milwaukee, as the previous scoring pylon was damaged and removed in 2016. Some say to get the IndyCar App on your phone and there is no need for any scoring display, but there will always be a sizable number of fans without this app. Sometimes this app goes down, as a fan reported from Iowa. Does Penske Entertainment or IndyCar provide or rent video boards to race venues? Is it the race venue’s responsibility for this? How is this done at other IndyCar tracks? Hopefully some type of display will be provided for Milwaukee races.
Bob Hunt, Milwaukee Mile fan
MP: According to the track, there will be multiple big video screens that will have the scrolling ticker and running order for IndyCar and Indy NXT. I’m also told there’s also a Dinosaurs of Rock concert from Quiet Riot.
Q: Where does Alexander Rossi land in 2025? He didn’t appear very prominently in the last Silly Season update, but I feel like a driver who’s very consistent in the top 10, capable of outracing Pato O’Ward reasonably often (even if the results this year don’t fully show it), and very good technically should be in high demand. I would hope that he could land in a Ganassi seat since Armstrong/Lundqvist don’t seem locked in and Palou might even leave for Audi.
If not, the new vacancy at MSR seems like the other best option, but maybe there’s too much Andretti baggage there given the current technical alliance and how he left that team? Or has he reached the stage of his career where he’s no longer of interest to the top teams, and he needs to be ready to step down the grid to help a DCR/ECR/Rahal/PREMA move forward a little? He seemed very relaxed about it all on his podcast with Hinch after the announcement he was leaving McLaren, but I haven’t seen his name in the news that much.
Max Camposano
MP: There’s a growing fear that Rossi will be out of IndyCar. He’s not going to Ganassi. As the last silly season piece offered, the team’s three-driver lineup is set. His manager has spoken to all the other teams, or tried to connect with all of them, and so far, the same message I receive is the price is too high for their taste or their bank account. I hope something changes because I’d hate to lose Alexander from the series. From all I’ve been told in the last week, if it isn’t PREMA, I’m not sure what else is left unless it involves a big price reduction.
Q: Just got back from a family vacation at Legoland where I saw a number of adult ‘Technic’ racing Lego sets in the store, including models for F1, Formula E, and NASCAR. But there are no IndyCar Lego sets. Can somebody at IndyCar please rectify this so I can hide my own gifts on my kids’ Christmas lists?
Eric, Hawthorn Woods, IL
MP: Make the call, Mark Miles!
Q: What are the odds that Alex Palou will leave Chip Ganassi’s IndyCar team at the end of this season for Formula 1? There is a rumor that he might join Sauber from 2025 onward. Is there any traction to this?
I was under the impression that Scott Dixon and Palou were a lock at Ganassi in IndyCar for 2025. I had read that Chip wants to downsize to three cars rather than the five the team currently fields.
If Palou tried to leave for Formula 1, wouldn’t McLaren try to get an injunction to prevent it? They could still mess with him because of their lawsuit over his contract and cash advance.
The team deeply resents Palou and has publicly stated that its misfortunes this year are on him. They believe that his not honoring a contract to drive has led to the multitude of drivers being rotated into the car driven by David Malukas, who injured his wrist and had to be let go.
Wouldn’t it make for a legal quagmire if three teams wanted his services and McLaren believed him to be under contract? I can’t see Ganassi letting Palou go anywhere either considering his strength, precision and ability to win championships. A potential third within four years is an incredible feat.
David Colquitt
MP: The rumor is a nothingburger. Alex Palou is contracted to drive for Ganassi for the next few years, so if he wants to try and leave for F1, he’d have two lawsuits to deal with, and I’m confident his newest Ganassi contract has the harshest of penalties if he were to try and pull this on Chip again like he did in 2022 and McLaren in 2023. He’s been the best driver in IndyCar since 2021, and there’s no way Ganassi voluntarily lets his best driver leave to be an asset for someone else.
Q: Well, I think the recent Malukas headline should read, “Malukas signs a multi-year deal with Penske”. I see either two scenarios: a) interest in Malukas wasn’t as much as one would think (not likely), or b) this is a heavily-backed Penske deal, he is being placed and developed at A.J. Foyt Racing in a low-pressure environment with lots of support, and he is Will Power’s replacement on down the road. Obviously, it doesn’t take too much to figure this out and I’m sure you’ve received many comments to this effect.
John Dowling, Ann Arbor, MI
MP: You write the news story as it’s presented. You write the silly season or Mailbag updates to color in the margins that don’t belong in a straight news piece. Malukas has been signed by Penske, I’m told, and is a one-year ‘rental’ by Foyt.