IndyCar mid-season musings

On Jul 5, 2025

Nine races down, eight to go, and just under 60 days left in the season.

Starting with a few of the major year-to-year changes and surprises, let’s explore some of the takeaways from the first half of the IndyCar championship ahead of this weekend’s return to action at the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio.

ARROW McLAREN

The most significant power shift in the paddock belongs to Arrow McLaren. Under the guidance of first-time team principal Tony Kanaan, and thanks to the addition of Christian Lundgaard, Arrow McLaren has moved to the front of the Team Chevy line for the first time in its history and displaced Team Penske as the Bowtie’s best and most consistent performer.

This has been a huge development for the McLaren-owned organization after Penske served as the tip of Chevy’s IndyCar spear for nine straight seasons. Penske’s drivers led Chevy to championships in 2016, 2017, 2019 and 2022, and when they weren’t winning titles, Penske produced the highest-placed Chevys in the standings.

With the exception of the opening race of 2025 at St. Petersburg, Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward and Lundgaard have been the top two drivers in the championship for Chevy from the second race at Thermal through the ninth and most recent race at Road America.

O’Ward holds third in the championship behind the Honda-powered duo of Alex Palou and Kyle Kirkwood, and Lundgaard, who fluctuated between second and third through the Indy 500, is sixth after a rough close to June. Penske’s leading driver all season has been Will Power in seventh, and he has teammate Scott McLaughlin close behind in eighth. Penske’s Josef Newgarden is 17th.

Lundgaard is within striking distance for Power and McLaughlin, but catching O’Ward to continue Penske’s streak for a 10th season will be a challenge. Power needs 31 points to draw level with Lundgaard and McLaughlin needs 38. To reach O’Ward, Power is staring at 78 points and it’s 85 for McLaughlin. It’s not an impossible task, but O’Ward’s season would need to collapse, and quickly, for a Penske driver to become Chevy’s top pilot in the championship.

TWO MORE McLAREN BITS

In concert with McLaren’s rise as a team, O’Ward has done a solid job of handling the extreme pressure that’s been applied by his new teammate. Lundgaard was determined to make a statement on debut at Arrow McLaren and succeeded in his mission as he was locked into the top three with Palou and Kirkwood with three podiums in the first four races. And then O’Ward perked up at the fifth race and took second place, and then third at Indy, seventh at Detroit, and second at WWTR before he and Lundgaard had forgettable days at Road America.

What looked like troubling times to open the year for O’Ward has stabilized in his favor, but half of the remaining races are road or street courses where Lundgaard can draw down the 47-point deficit to O’Ward. However, the other four races – all ovals – are also where O’Ward is in a different league, so the internecine battle between the two is likely settled as it stands today. Lundgaard can move up in the championship, but a lot of bad luck would need to fall on O’Ward at Iowa’s doubleheader, Milwaukee and Nashville to swap championship positions. Let’s also not forget that O’Ward won at Mid-Ohio last year, and that of his seven career IndyCar victories, 57 percent have been on road and streets.

Arrow McLaren’s not just Pato O’Ward’s team anymore. Chris Jones/IMS Photo

And what a fun half-season it’s been in watching these hunter-killers orbit each other under the same tent. For O’Ward, this isn’t the same situation he had with former teammates who were the clear No. 2 drivers based on speed and finishing positions. Lundgaard is the fastest driver Arrow McLaren has placed next to him, and the threat is real. In nine races, he’s delivered six top 10s while learning a new team, new engineer, and new engine. If Lundgaard can raise his oval game to equal O’Ward – which isn’t guaranteed – we’ll have some real fireworks that push the Mexican to his limits.

Also, in a new IndyCar twist for Lundgaard, he’s learning how to deal with an IndyCar teammate who is as fast, if not faster, and isn’t easily beaten. Just as O’Ward’s dealt with significant new pressure, Lundgaard’s having to process what it’s like to no longer be the clear No. 1 driver. It’s a growth year for both Arrow McLaren pilots.

For those who’ve followed IndyCar for a little while, what’s happening at the team in 2025 is reminiscent of its 2018 season when rookie Robert Wickens arrived and transformed the program into a steady dual threat alongside James Hinchcliffe. That dynamic has returned, a one-car force has become two, and the team has risen to lead the Chevy camp. Nothing here is a coincidence.

The next question to answer is whether O’Ward or Lundgaard will be the first to reach victory lane this season.

AJ FOYT RACING

Santino Ferrucci has been the best driver in IndyCar over the last four races. With finishes of fifth at the Indy 500, second at Detroit, fifth at WWTR, and third at Road America, he’s had a better string of results than Palou, Kirkwood and the rest of the drivers in the field.

He’s on his third race engineer since September, which only adds to the impressive form Ferrucci’s been showing. He took pole position at Portland last year, which foretold what was possible at the reinvigorated Foyt team as Ferrucci and Penske engineer James Schnabel proved to be a formidable duo.

With Penske’s signing of David Malukas during the offseason and placement in the sister Foyt car, Schnabel was moved over to the Malukas machine so Michael Armbrester, who engineered Sting Ray Robb last season, was assigned to Ferrucci’s car, and in June, he was promoted to technical director and Adam Kolesar was appointed as Ferrucci’s latest race engineer. Change, change, and more change, but no change in output.

There’s clear chemistry between the two as the No. 14 Chevy has not only been the top Foyt car at the finish line since Indy, but Ferrucci has been the best among all Penske/Penske-affiliated entries as well. He’s six points behind Penske’s McLaughlin and 13 shy of Power. In 2024, he was 12th in the championship ahead of Mid-Ohio and is up three places to ninth at the moment.

Knocking back the beer after the checkered flag at Road America while live on FOX was a fun moment for Ferrucci, and he’s definitely drawn more attention from that clip, but his work behind the wheel is where the spotlight belongs.

Similar kudos for Malukas whose immense talent is shining through in the other Foyt car. He’s 10 points back from Ferrucci in 12th and continues to hunt for the kind of consistency that is required to be a fixture in the top 10. Eliminate some of the major and minor mistakes, and he’s right there with his teammate in the standings.

ANDRETTI GLOBAL

Ganassi managing director Mike Hull says that with the heavy restrictions in on-track testing, it takes three years for a rookie IndyCar driver to properly develop the skills and experience that’s necessary to shine. Some get there faster; Palou was a champion in his second season. Andretti’s Colton Herta was third in the standings as a sophomore, and Lundgaard was eighth for RLL in his second championship run.

In his third season, Kirkwood has raised his game from up-and-comer to title contender. Chris Jones/IMS Photo

Hull’s three-year forecast, at least in the case of Andretti’s Kirkwood, is right on the mark. He rose to seventh in last year’s standings – albeit well behind teammate Herta who clinched second behind Palou – and has put those three years of education to good use in 2025 as he’s become the top dog at Andretti Global. Following Herta’s run to second in the championship, he was the natural pick to carry that momentum into the new season, but misfortune has ruled most of his year with issues in the pits, the crash ahead of qualifying at Indy, and some race-day strategies that didn’t work as intended.

In 10th place with 184 points, Herta’s more than 100 points down to Kirkwood and 202 to Palou coming off a 2024 season where he lost the title to Palou by 32 points. It leaves the year’s breakout performer in Kirkwood as Andretti’s only hope to take the fight to Palou, fend off the approaching O’Ward and, in a bizarre and unforeseen move, rely on Herta to function as his wingman during the second half of the championship.

A win for Herta’s a great thing if it means beating Palou, but there’s only one Andretti driver with a remote chance of being crowned as champion. If it wants to win its first title since 2012, Kirkwood’s vast need to erase the imposing 93-point lead held by Palou is the only priority for the three-car squad. Individual goals or team goals? That’s the question facing Andretti’s leadership.

MEYER SHANK RACING

After Arrow McLaren, the Meyer Shank Racing team has made the largest year-to-year gains and that comes as a result of shifting its technical alliance to Chip Ganassi Racing. MSR closed 2024 with Felix Rosenqvist in 12th place and the second car, which used a range of drivers, in 20th. It had Andretti Global as its technical partner, and as noted, Herta placed second in the championship, which suggests MSR wasn’t getting the most out of the arrangement.

That’s changed, and drastically so, with CGR where Rosenqvist is fourth in the standings and second best within the greater CGR/MSR universe. CGR’s Scott Dixon is fifth. And newcomer Marcus Armstrong, who jumped across from CGR, is 11th, one point away from being in the top 10.

Going from 12th and 20th to fourth and 11th in a half-season is remarkable, and both sides continue to develop and find ways to improve their working relationship. Rather than treat MSR like a client, CGR has adopted MSR as a member of its family, and the results cannot be ignored.

Rosenqvist’s consistency has lifted MSR to new heights. James Black/IMS Photo

Rosenqvist’s had four top fives from nine IndyCar races; MSR’s never had that many top fives across an entire season with any car or driver in its history. Armstrong, whose speed and talent was often tempered with inconsistency on race days, is also finding a great groove with five top 10s at MSR.

Under Mike Shank, Jim and Tim Meyer, and team boss Adam Rovazzini, MSR has taken what CGR has to offer and turned themselves into a sharper organization that is on the cusp of something big with both drivers. Like his former teammate O’Ward, Rosenqvist is a demon on short ovals and could be in contention for more podiums and possibly a win before the season ends on Aug. 31. One year ago, such things weren’t spoken of as anything more than a distant hope.

TEAM PENSKE

The competitive struggles for Team Penske have been downright strange after Power ran second to Palou for most of 2024 and the team won seven out of 17 races with Power, Newgarden and McLaughlin.

Like Herta’s wildly unanticipated drop from second to close last season to 10th on approach to Mid-Ohio, the same bewilderment is found with Penske’s winless 2025. And it would be easy to point towards the eruptive month of May with the fines, penalties and firings as the cause of the slide, but all that went wrong starting at the Indy 500 only compounded their problems.

In the five races that ran before the 500, Penske’s drivers had a single podium apiece, with Power taking four finishes between third and sixth and McLaughlin delivering the same exact number of thirds through sixths. For any other team, a handful of thirds, fourths, fifths, and sixths would be a cause for celebration, but Team Penske is a different animal.

To vie for championships, firsts, seconds, and thirds are the price of admission, and with a pair of fifths and a sixth from Power and a pair of fourths and a sixth from McLaughlin, the small rearward step by the team to start 2025 was evident. Including the 500, the negative effects from May and an overabundance of misfortune have torn through the team’s results.

Power’s gone 16th, fourth, 27th and 14th. McLaughlin, who was the consensus pick to win the championship leading into St. Pete, has gone 30th, 12th, 24th and 12th. And Newgarden, who hasn’t been able to dodge the anvils, has finishes of 22nd, ninth, 25th, and 25th.

Oddly enough, it wasn’t that long ago – 2021, in fact – where Penske went 0-for-9 to start the season and then Newgarden won at Mid-Ohio and won again at WWTR to take second behind first-time champion Palou. What’s going on at the moment isn’t new territory for Penske, but it’s still a strange situation for the perennial title contenders.

Barring divine Intervention, there’s no reasonable path for Power, in seventh with 189 points required to draw even with Palou, or McLaughlin in eighth with 196 points to manufacture, to win the championship. It’s even worse for Newgarden, in 17th with 249 points separating himself from Palou.

We’ve just entered July – have half a season yet to run – and the entire Penske team is out of the championship conversation. Mind-boggling stuff.

JUNCOS HOLLINGER RACING

The team owned by Ricardo Juncos and Brad Hollinger is going through a rather typical everything-is-new season. Two new drivers. Two new race engineers. New technical director. For a midfield team, it’s the kind of wholesale overhaul that conspires against immediate success, and that’s precisely what Juncos Hollinger Racing has witnessed as it rolls off the transporters with speed one weekend and spends the next event searching for wherever the speed went off and hid.

The boom-or-bust cycle they’re in is frustrating, and yet, the bones of a really good team are here. JHR went into Mid-Ohio last year with Romain Grosjean in 14th place, and with all of the changes in mind, Conor Daly sitting 18th – right between Newgarden and Graham Rahal – isn’t bad. Teammate Robb in 24th also has the feel of better-than-expected results at this stage of the season.

Daly and Robb should thrive at the four oval races and stand a good chance of moving forward in the championship. Even so, the team isn’t impressed with any aspect of where it resides in the standings.

More than any other team, JHR sticks out as the one that could undergo the biggest changes to its driver line-up and business structure before the year is over. Hollinger, who funds most of the team, is looking for an investor to join in and return JHR to a place where it hires its drivers. Who knows if that will happen, but that’s the goal, and if an investor is found and the team has a competitive budget for driver salaries, be prepared for at least one change, if not two.

Using the eight remaining races to become a better team in preparation for next season is where JHR is focused.

DALE COYNE RACING

The team owned by Dale Coyne is going through a rather typical everything-is-new season. Two new drivers. Two new race engineers. For last year’s worst-placing team in the standings, it’s the kind of wholesale overhaul that conspires against immediate success, but history be damned…because its entry for Rinus VeeKay has defied every prediction that was made.

The Dutchman has five finishes inside the top 10, which Coyne hasn’t seen since 2021 with Grosjean, and holds 14th in the championship. All of this after being the last driver signed for the season and getting one test day in the car with his new and now former race engineer Ed Nathman. Three of those top 10s came with Nathman, and since he was replaced by the returning Michael Cannon in June, two more were added.

Where JHR is a newer team in transition and feeling its effects, Dale Coyne Racing has been in a semi-permanent state of change for decades, but it’s loaded with old school talent to blend with the youth and new faces that cycle in each year. Change is normal for DCR, which is why its effects have been diminished compared to JHR.

And now VeeKay has Cannon calling the engineering shots and rookie teammate Jacob Abel has Mike Colliver as his new engineer. Prior to the change, Abel and John Dick had an average finishing position of 25.0, which included a failure to qualify for the Indy 500. Since the switch, Abel’s average has improved to 20.7, which is more in line with where the 2024 Indy NXT runner-up should be finishing in his debut season.

Abel is 27th and last in the standings – and by a wide margin – so miracles might be required to capture a Leaders Circle contract, but if he can keep putting distance between himself and the terrible pre-Colliver results with quality finishes near the top 20, the year won’t be remembered as a waste of time and talent.

ED CARPENTER RACING

ECR is stronger and more competitive than it was prior to the big investment and ownership stake taken by Ted Gelov and the acquisition of Alexander Rossi as its new lead driver. It just hasn’t translated into immediate results with Rossi holding 13th in the standings, which is where the car he’s driving ended last season with former driver VeeKay.

VeeKay had seven top 10s by the end of the year; Rossi has four and is on pace to equal or improve upon that tally, and the team is clearly continuing to build around the Indy 500 winner. VeeKay was in his fifth season with ECR while rising to 13th; Rossi’s up to 13th in a half-season.

There was hope for a bigger punch to open the year, but the second half of the championship, with the heavy rotation of ovals, is the perfect run to march into the top 10.

Rasmussen’s aggression has buoyed ECR. Karl Zemlin/IMS Photo

The one obvious rise within ECR has been Rossi’s sophomore teammate Christian Rasmussen. The Dane is 15th in the standings, just 11 points behind Rossi, and that’s noteworthy. There’s also a lot of work left to be done. Through June of 2024, Rasmussen’s average qualifying position was 18.8. It’s slipped to 19.1, which only makes life harder, but he’s jumped from an average finish of 20.3 to 15.0, which explains why he’s hot on the heels of his veteran teammate in the championship.

If ECR can prioritize Rasmussen’s growth on Saturdays and get the average starting spot down a few positions, the 2023 Indy NXT champ could be a revelation to close the season.

PREMA RACING

The team assembled and led by Piers Phillips has become increasingly competent by the midway point in the season. Rookie Robert Shwartzman is 21st in the standings, veteran teammate is a ongoing surprise down in 26th, but both have led races this year based on speed and quality, which was never anticipated.

There isn’t much to say about the program other than it’s gaining knowledge and out-performing more experienced teams at a growing rate.

RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING

The team made offseason additions and improvements on the engineering side, signed a new president in Jay Frye one month into the season, and its cars were notably faster at the Indy 500. Behind the scenes, RLL is a better team than it was in 2024.

But with its drivers ranked between 19th and 25th in the championship, RLL looks nothing like the outfit that took four poles in 2023 and won a race with Lundgaard, who finished eighth in the standings. Or, despite a lack of poles and wins, took 11th last year with Lundgaard.

The Dane was the team’s consistent chance to fight inside the top 12 at almost every race. He was their outlier and that outlier is gone. And that’s RLL’s half-season in a nutshell.

And then there’s Lundgaard’s successor, Louis Foster. Yes, he’s 23rd in the standings, but Lord, RLL has one hell of a driver on its hands with the Briton. Foster’s only problem is he’s a rookie at a time where the team could really use a Kirkwood or Palou.

If they could drop Foster into a time machine, give him another season or two of experience, and bring him back for Sunday’s race, RLL has its new star quarterback. But for now, it’s a waiting game as the kid with extraordinary speed and skill bides his time and goes through the ups and many downs while learning to become an IndyCar driver.

Foster’s pole at the last race was further evidence of his potential and that was his third trip inside the Firestone Fast 12 from seven road and street course events. Stepping into Lundgaard’s big shoes was an unenviable task, but look at where his predecessor was entering Mid-Ohio in 2024 with an average starting position of 10.3 – in the Dane’s third IndyCar season – and where Foster is today with an average of 12.9. The kid’s a rocket. But in the races where Foster’s inexperience and poor luck has been a liability, his average finish is 19.4, a retreat of 6.5 spots.

Last year, in the same car, Lundgaard was at 12.5, and there you have what the team is missing.

It has been tough to watch the team spin its wheels, but Foster, with more seasoning, has the look of RLL’s next breakout star. Until that time arrives, it’s got to keep an eye on the Leaders’ Circle race.

All three of its entries were inside the top 22 cutoff last year and earned $1 million contracts. Devlin DeFrancesco’s entry is on the wrong side of the cut line at the moment in 25th and Foster’s entry is on the bubble.

CHIP GANASSI RACING

The last time a driver took ownership of an IndyCar season in the same manner as Alex Palou was in 2020 when Chip Ganassi Racing teammate Dixon led the championship from start to finish on the way to securing his sixth crown. Before that, it was Team Penske’s Power reeling off six wins in 2011, but Ganassi’s Dario Franchitti used four wins and nine podiums to keep Power at bay and capture the title.

Power’s six wins in a season – from 17 races that year – is the most recent peak for an IndyCar driver, and with six wins from nine so far, Palou can rewrite modern history with a seventh before the championship is completed.

Palou arrived at Mid-Ohio in 2024 with a relatively slim championship lead of 23 points over Power. Dixon was 32 points behind in third. Down in 10th, Rosenqvist was 109 points shy of the eventual champion.

Palou rolled out at Mid-Ohio this week with 93 points on Kirkwood and if Rosenqvist felt like he was far away last year in 10th with a 109-point margin to reduce, imagine what O’Ward is feeling at the moment in third with a 111-point deficit. Today’s 10th-place driver, Herta, is an impossible 202 points back from Palou.

THE NEW ALEX PALOU

Sure, he was quick. Alex Palou was also extraordinarily safe, calculating, and conservative. It produced nothing like the thrills and combative driving styles of a O’Ward or Newgarden. That was the knock on Palou through 2024 as he perfected the underwhelming formula to win his first, second, and third championships. He was the sneaky champion who preyed upon the weaknesses and misfortunes of others. But that guy has been hard to find in 2025.

With three titles to his credit in five seasons, a new version of the Spaniard turned up in St. Petersburg. Deploying the same championship-winning strategy would have been the easy play in his quest to become a four-timer. Why change what’s working to such devastating effect?

Well, what if greater devastation was possible with a change to the formula? What if removing the safety net could unlock more success?

Whatever colors he’s running, Palou’s been a blur to everyone else this year. Chris Jones/IMS Photo

After six wins in nine races, taking his first oval win at the Indianapolis 500 of all places, two poles, three fastest laps, matching his win tally from 2021, 2022, and 2024 combined, and leading the championship for the entire season to date, the switch from risk-averse champion to All Gas No Brake Palou has been a blast to watch. And damn near unstoppable.