Christian Lundgaard has 52 career NTT INDYCAR SERIES starts, all with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing. Next season, he transitions to Arrow McLaren driving the No. 7 Chevrolet.
The NTT INDYCAR SERIES oval test Oct. 11 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway was the first time Lundgaard turned laps with his new team.
“It’s a very different feeling,” Lundgaard said. “The difference is how the car not necessarily handles but stable on the ground, which was nice.”
Lundgaard and RLL struggled to find competitive qualifying speeds on the 2.5-mile IMS oval. RLL had three of the slowest four qualifiers in 2023 and three of the bottom seven this year. Lundgaard qualified 31st, 30th and 28th, respectively, in his three “500” starts with the team.
By comparison, Arrow McLaren put two of its three cars in the top eight starting spots in 2022, all three in the top seven in 2023 and fourth, fifth, eighth and 15th this May.
Adapting to how Arrow McLaren attacks a test and how it prepares a race car compared to his RLL days was the top agenda for Lundgaard. The second item was learning the team personnel and how they operate.
Arrow McLaren is building a racing empire featuring a vast arsenal of employees. Alexander Rossi, the driver Lundgaard replaced, detailed his experience on learning all the names and faces in 2023 when he joined the team from Andretti Global for a two-season stint.
Lundgaard faces the same circumstances.
“Not very good with names,” Lundgaard said. “There’s a lot of new names to get used to, and it’s difficult, especially because after this, we’ll basically be apart for quite awhile until we reunite at the end of the year. I won’t really have time to get to know everybody. So, I’ll still kind of show up next year, and it’s like, ‘Who are you?’
“It’s important to get to know each other now and to work together.”
Lundgaard joked name tags would be great, but remember names and faces is part of the process of changing teams. Most importantly, he is happy to be part of the papaya program.
The familiarity already is there with teammates Pato O’Ward and Nolan Siegel, who Lundgaard competed against last season. O’Ward is the senior member of the team in both age (25) and experience (five years).
“I'm the old guy in the team, having Nolan and Christian in there,” O’Ward said. “Definitely feels a bit different. I would say not the baby anymore.”
O’Ward joked he has the grandpa role but is going to embrace sharing his knowledge with his teammates.
“Being the wise guy,” he said. “I’m going to teach Nolan and Christian. Whatever they want to know, I’ve got experiences.”
Lundgaard aspires to challenge O’Ward, who has the last seven Arrow McLaren victories, for race wins with the team next season. Lundgaard won the 2023 NTT P1 Award and race in July 2023 at Toronto. He also took NTT P1 Award honors for the 2023 Sonsio Grand Prix on the IMS road course.
Along with two poles and one race victory in his career are three top-three finishes, seven top-five efforts and 21 top 10s. He finished 14th in points as a rookie in 2022, eighth in 2023 and 11th last season.