NTT INDYCAR SERIES points leader Alex Palou (pictured) and Chip Ganassi Racing teammate Scott Dixon were among four drivers who will be taking a nine-position grid penalties for Saturday’s Bommarito Automotive Group 500 presented by Axalta and Valvoline.
INDYCAR officials announced Friday morning that Palou, Dixon, Meyer Shank Racing’s Felix Rosenqvist (No. 60 AutoNation/SiriusXM Honda) and Dale Coyne Racing’s Katherine Legge (No. 51 e.l.f. Cosmetics Honda) will drop nine spots from their qualifying positions for unapproved engine changes following the July 21 race on the Streets of Toronto.
SEE: Starting Lineup
The teams were in violation of:
Rule 16.1.2.3.2. A fifth (5th) Engine is eligible to earn Engine Manufacturer points if a Full Season Entrant has completed the Full Season Entrant Engine Mileage with its first four (4) Engines. Otherwise, a fifth (5th) or more Engine does not earn Engine Manufacturer points and will be considered an Unapproved Engine change-out.
According to Rule 16.1.6.1.2., the penalty is a six-position starting grid penalty on road and street course events and nine positions at oval events and will be served at the series’ next event which is Saturday’s 260-lap race airing at 6 p.m. ET on USA Network, Peacock and the INDYCAR Radio Network.
Dixon said the Ganassi team decided it was beneficial to make the change at this point in the season. Saturday’s race is one of five left in the season, the first of four on oval tracks.
“The decision of picking the tracks, you kind of think maybe you’ve got more options with an oval strategy wise,” he said.
Dixon and Palou had a similar strategy last year electing for engine changes and grid penalties at the 1.25-mile track. That decision paid off with Dixon charging from 16th at the start after qualifying seventh to win while Palou climbed from 14th to seventh.
Palou said this year the situation isn’t as ideal, but his No. 10 Samaritan Purse Chip Ganassi Racing didn’t have a choice.
“We couldn’t do one more race,” he said after qualifying seventh. “Even if this was Portland, we had to take it here.”
Palou will drop to 16th at the start of Saturday’s race with Dixon falling from 10th to 19th in his No. 9 PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing Honda.
To make matters worse for the championship leader, Rosenqvist qualified second and in dropping back will allow Team Penske’s Will Power, who is second in points, to move up to fourth in his No. 12 Verizon Business Team Penske Chevrolet.
What concerns Palou the most is this may not be the final engine penalty coming his direction. With three short oval races remaining, including the Hy-Vee Milwaukee Mile 250s doubleheader and the Sept. 15 Nashville Superspeedway season finale, the two-time and defending series champion said there’s a lot of mileage and full throttle time left.
Power, McLaughlin Look to Capitalize on CGR Engine Changes
With Palou and Dixon starting mid-pack, how does that change the way NTT P1 Award winner, Scott McLaughlin, and Team Penske teammate Power attack Saturday’s 260-lap race?
The duo won the last two oval races on the schedule sweeping the Iowa Speedway race weekend on July 13-14.
“Hard to say,” Power said. “These things swing so quick. You’ve got to take it for what it is at the time. You know what the smart thing is to do and not like Toronto.”
What Power is referring to is when he was overly aggressive on a late race restart in Toronto. At the time, McLaughlin was fourth and Power fifth. Power punted McLaughlin which relegated McLaughlin to a 16th-place effort. Power was penalized for avoidable contact and dropped to 12th.
Palou climbed from 18th to finish fourth, gaining points on the duo.
McLaughlin comes to WWTR sixth in points trailing Palou by 83. Power is 49 points back in second. McLaughlin is tied with Pato O’Ward for the best average finish among the three oval races this season at 3.33.
“I just run my race and keep going,” McLaughlin said with track position. “It (bad luck) can happen to any one of us. We’ll just keep focused on what we need to do and slowly find our way back in this championship. I know we can.”
Fittipaldi Enjoyed Break
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing driver Pietro Fittipaldi said his three-week break was shorter than normal. He traveled across the globe landing in three different countries.
“I went to Spa in Belgium for my duties with the Haas F1 Team after Toronto, which was fun,” he said. “Then I stayed for two weeks in North Carolina with my family just enjoying the time there with my siblings, my parents and the dogs at home. I went biking with my brother, which we enjoy and played a lot of pickleball.
Fittipaldi also devoted time to simulator work in his state-of-the-art simulator at home in efforts of ending the 2024 season on a high note.
“We’ve had chances for good top-10, top-12 finishes recently but have unfortunately been hit with some adversity, most of which was out of our control to be honest. We’ve just got to keep pushing and keep executing because I’m sure the results will come. We’re getting ready for another short oval race which I really enjoy so we’re all excited for that.”
This will be Fittipaldi’s second time racing at WWTR. He climbed 10 spots as a rookie in 2018 to finish 11th with Dale Coyne Racing.
Lundgaard Hopeful to Hold Contenders Off; Rahal Expects to Climb
Christian Lundgaard is optimistic that he can finish near the top-10 of the NTT INDYCAR SERIES points standings at seasons end. He enters WWTR 11th after 12 races. At this point last year he was ninth and gained a spot to finish eighth in points.
The difference this year compared to last is there was three natural road courses, one street circuit and one oval over the final five events of 2023 with four ovals and one natural road course this time around.
“Having four of the final five races be on ovals definitely favors those that have strong oval packages and could help them make steps forward in the standings,” said Lundgaard.
Lundgaard is two points behind Santino Ferrucci for 10th in the standings but only 32 points ahead of teammate Graham Rahal who is 17th.
Lundgaard thinks his No. 45 Hy-Vee Honda team for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing has potential to move forward, but improvements are needed in order to do so.
The third-year driver ranks 15th in the field with a 17.33 average finishing position on ovals this season. In a pair of WWTR starts, he finished 19th and 17th, respectively. His best oval finish to date is 10th-place in Race 1 of the 2022 Hy-Vee INDYCAR Weekend doubleheader.
Rahal has the opposite outlook and expects to charge forward. The speed he flashed in the Iowa Speedway doubleheader and the strength he expects to have with his oval package at Milwaukee and Nashville has Rahal expecting big things.
Portland could be the icing on the cake.
“Portland is coming up and is a track we were on pole last year so that has us optimistic of a good weekend,” he said. “I have very high expectations there. It’s important to get as many points as possible. We’ve been very competitive this year in a lot of places but haven’t been able to pull all of it together so it would be nice to finish up front with a win, or even a podium in this final stretch.”
Odds and Ends
· BorgWarner was chosen from a wide pool of entries to receive recognition as winners in PR Daily's Social Media & Digital Awards in the LinkedIn category for its Charging Forward campaign, as well as in the Twitter/X Category for its Borg-Warner Trophy Speaks to Racing Fans campaign. For the LinkedIn category, BorgWarner created a yearlong branding campaign in order to align BorgWarner with top talent in the automotive industry. The company began building buzz in the first half of 2023 with a shift in its organic LinkedIn presence, focusing on brand storytelling, PR amplification and thought leadership. The campaign also highlighted employees' career accomplishments, innovative projects and reports while supporting advocacy, diversity and inclusion, and opportunities for growth, all while offering potential recruits a behind-the-scenes look at the company's culture. In addition to impressive metrics on LinkedIn, traffic to the Careers section of BorgWarner's website increased – the page was visited nearly 1.2 million times in 2023, up 38 percent from the prior year. Of those visitors, 69 percent went on to view job opportunities.
· The 49 points that separate Palou and Power is the seventh-largest point margin with five races remaining since INDYCAR SERIES racing was unified in 2008. Before this season, the average lead with five races remaining was 43.9 points.
· Since 2008, the championship leader with five races to go has won the championship nine times. Those drivers were: Dixon (2008, 2018, 2020), Dario Franchitti (2011), Ryan Hunter-Reay (2012), Simon Pagenaud (2016), Josef Newgarden (2019) and Palou (2021, 2023).
· There are 18 drivers still mathematically eligible for the 2024 NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship: Palou, Power, Dixon, Colton Herta, O’Ward, McLaughlin, Kyle Kirkwood, Newgarden, Alexander Rossi, Santino Ferrucci, Lundgaard, Marcus Ericsson, Rosenqvist, Marcus Armstrong, Rinus VeeKay, Romain Grosjean, Graham Rahal and Linus Lundqvist. Any driver who trails the points leader by 217 points or more following this race will be eliminated from contention.
· Team Penske has the most World Wide Technology Raceway victories with eight (1997, 2002, 2003, 2017, 2018, 2020-Race 2, 2021, 2022). It won two of the first three NASCAR Cup Series races on the 1.25-mile track with Joey Logano (2022) and Austin Cindric (2024).
· The closest margin of victory at World Wide Technology is 0.0399 sec with Takuma Sato topping Ed Carpenter on Aug. 24, 2019.
· Pato O’Ward has finished runner-up in three of the last four World Wide Technology Raceway events. David Malukas in 2022 is the only driver since the second race of 2020 to finish second. This is the second time in the last three seasons that O’Ward entered the 13th race of a season fifth in points. He was sixth a year ago.
· Since the series’ return to World Wide Technology Raceway in 2017, Dixon is the only Chip Ganassi Racing driver to finish on the podium. He won in 2020 and 2023, finished runner-up in 2017 and third in 2018.
· Through 12 races into a season, Rossi has accumulated the same number of points (265) each of the past three seasons. He was 10th in points in 2022 and 2023 and ninth this season despite making 11 starts. He didn’t race in Toronto due to a broken thumb suffered from a practice crash.
· Palou has led the NTT INDYCAR SERIES points standings after 12 races in three of the last four years. He won the championship in the previous two.
· Dixon is third in points in three of the last four years through 12 races into a season. He accumulated 357 points at this time last season and 358 points this year.