Sting Ray Robb returns to Juncos Hollinger Racing for the 2025 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season. The 23-year-old Idaho driver spent three seasons across two motorsport divisions racing for the Indianapolis-based team.
Robb first joined JHR for the 2019 USF Pro 2000 Championship, finishing fourth in his third season in the series. The next year, he won the season title with seven race wins, five poles and 11 top-three finishes in 17 starts.
Robb competed for JHR in INDY NXT a season later but finished eighth in points with a best race result of sixth. He left the team at season’s end and moved to Andretti Global where he won the penultimate race at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca and finished second in points with eight top-three finishes in 14 races.
Robb advanced to compete in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES the last two years for Dale Coyne Racing, then spent this year with AJ Foyt Racing. He then faced free agency for 2025.
JHR was an option for him to come back and race, but he said repairs to the relationship needed fixed.
“There was actually a bit of mending that had to happen between us before I was comfortable moving back there with them,” Robb said. “I was with the team for three years and winning a championship with them was one of the highlights of my career so far. There's a lot of relationships that were built over those three years.
“So, when I left in 2021, it wasn't on the best of terms. I wouldn't say we burned the bridge, by any means, but, Ricardo (Juncos) and I sat down before we signed the contract this year, and I think that we kind of had a heart-to-heat, like, ‘Hey, we're recognizing where things went wrong in 2021 and we feel like we have reconciled that, and we recognize this is where we are now, and this is where our heads are.’
“We were kind of comparing notes on where we would like to be for 2025 and what the expectations would be, and they really aligned. So, getting to see him face to face and look each other in the eyes and say, ‘Hey, is this really going to work?’ And then the answer was yes.”
Robb is eager for the 2025 season.
“I think that that was really good for both of us to have the confidence in each other and the trust in each other that we once had, considering we had won a championship together back in 2020,” he said.
Robb believes that reflection between both sides in the last three years revealed the whole picture and that rekindling a past relationship is often stronger than the previous version.
“It really reveals to you who it is you're dealing with in a sense that, I got to see the passion in the team when we won the championship in 2020 and then I got to see, sort of, the passion that (Juncos) had for INDYCAR that kind of distracted his focus away from the INDY NXT program in 2021. That was who Ricardo is, and his success is very evident throughout his career. They came from nothing, and now they're an INDYCAR team that can finish on podiums, so I think that my appreciation and respect for them has gone up since that reconciliation. It’s not like we were ever on bad terms, but I got to see the full story played out, which was kind of cool.”
What lured Robb to discuss employment options with JHR was how its 2024 season ended. Driver Romain Grosjean had three top-10 finishes in his final seven races. His fourth-place finish at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca on June 23 was the best JHR finish in its brief INDYCAR SERIES history. Conor Daly later upped that to a third-place result on Aug. 31 at Milwaukee Mile. Daly had two top-10 finishes in five JHR starts after replacing Agustin Canapino during the Olympic break – both occurring in the final three races.
“I think a lot of it is just retention of the guys that are there,” Robb said. “Continuity does a lot in this sport, and when you can have continuity year over year, that momentum is a lot easier to maintain and also build off of. And it's not even so much momentum, it's creating a foundation to grow from.
“And so, when we were looking at 2025, our goal was to have continuity going through this season. Obviously, that's not going to happen, but this is a good enough move for me to where I feel the team itself has continuity together. There is some leadership change, but it's not it's not going to change the program. The program is going to be able to grow during this off season, rather than completely start over. I think that that's the biggest benefit that we're going to see. It kind of allows me to plug into the system, because they have one in place already.”
Robb isn’t getting over his skis to suggest he will catapult to a series championship in 2025, but improvement in terms of results is the goal. Robb described last season with AJ Foyt Racing as his second rookie year. The lack of continuity and learning a new team forced a slow process of results.
Still, Robb gained three spots in points – from 23rd to 20th -- between the first two seasons and an increase of 48 points (147 to 185). Those numbers are nice, but Robb said the right mindset and process will help improvement and everything else will follow.
“Over the course of the last two years, I've let those numbers be more of a driver initiative, and it's not bad to see him every once in a while to give yourself some accountability, but I think that the biggest improvements are made away from those numbers,” he said. “My goal is to not focus on those but focus on the things that we can do better, things that we are doing right and can continue to do in the future.”
Expectations for 2025 are different because there are constants and familiar faces. The car is the same. The Firestone Firehawk Racing Tires are similar. Trends are worthwhile and he’s grown a lot as a driver, too. Also, Juncos’ brother, Mariano, was Robb’s mechanic during his 2020 championship season. He is the one tasked with building Robb’s car this season.
“They recognize my habits already because I was with them for three years,” he said. “They know what they're looking at and I think that's why they were so willing to put me in the car because they believe in who I am, and I've had that trust in them for a long time. That momentum stands on both sides. I think that they got to see some highlights from my season. They also got to see the low lights as well, and how I was able to recover from those. So, I think that we're both kind of standing looking at each other with hopeful eyes and looking at the momentum that we could build early on.”
Robb is on his third team in three years, but is repeating itself?
When he joined JHR in 2019, that was his third team in three seasons. That was a big year for him that led to a championship a year later.
“The competition was there, the cars were very quick around us, and it was just like that confidence built through the season with the team,” he said. “It’s because they had a great program, had great structure, they had a lot of trust in me and my feedback. And I think that if we could do that again, that same result could happen.”