AUSTIN, TX – Santino Ferrucci only has three NTT IndyCar Series tracks that he’s raced at before. He drove for Dale Coyne Racing in 2018 in the doubleheader at Belle Isle as well as the final two races of the year at Portland and Sonoma. One of those three tracks though is no longer on the schedule anymore.

So, for him to say how comfortable he was during Tuesday’s test at Circuit of the Americas – well that’s saying something.

The reason is because of the actual track itself. See, Ferrucci cut his teeth racing overseas in Europe. He was on track to be the next great American driver in Formula One. He rose up the ranks and was racing on F1 tracks just last year.

COTA, is an F1 track. The characteristics of the 3.41-mile Texas road course are reminiscent of the European tracks that the rookie has drove on in the past.

That’s why he was an impressive ninth fastest (1:48.3851-seconds) in his No. 19 Honda for the day. He did so by completing only 33 laps too. Only one driver (Tony Kanaan) completed fewer laps.

“It was an exciting first day at Circuit of The Americas,” said Ferrucci. “We made a lot of progress improving the balance of our David Yurman race car. I’m looking forward to another full day tomorrow with the team. The track is unique in its own special way and I think we’re adapting to it pretty well compared to other teams. We’ll see what we can get out of it tomorrow and go from there. You definitely can tell that this is more of a European-type circuit, so I feel a little bit more at home than I would at the old school tracks. Nonetheless, it’s a very fast track with a very technical slow speed section. So it has its good points and its points where you struggle. It’s all good fun though.”

Ferrucci, was like this in his few opportunities last year too. He was just always in the top half of the speed charts in nearly every session. This is another good indication that he’s going to be a very underrated driver in 2019.