TRACK HISTORY/Detroit RACE TRENDS

This is an inaugural race so no trends to look at here specifically for the track.

• 3 of the 5 street course races a year ago were won from a front row starting spot.
  • St. Pete this past year, was won from the second row (4th place).
  • Long Beach this year was won from the pole.

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TRACK COMPARISONS/WHO’S BEEN GOOD ON THEM

If you go back to the start of the 2019 season, we’ve had 18 races on these tracks with 10 different winners. Josef Newgarden (4 wins), Scott Dixon (3 wins), Marcus Ericsson (3 wins) and Colton Herta (2 wins) are the only multi-time winners with 2 of Newgarden’s 4 wins coming in St. Pete.

The big teams are strong on them with Penske winning 7 of those last 18 races, Ganassi with 5 and Andretti with 4. Arrow McLaren SP is the only other team to have won.

Penske won 3 of the 5 last year with Ganassi and Scott Dixon taking the other two. Ganassi (Marcus Ericsson) is 1-for-2 this year with being winners in 3 of the last 4 while Andretti won the last time out in Long Beach.

Honda is 2-for-2 on street courses this season with taking 5 of the 6 podiums too. It went Ganassi-McLaren-Ganassi in St. Pete and Andretti-Andretti-Ganassi in Long Beach.

Right now, this is an Andretti vs. Ganassi battle on street courses.

In Long Beach, the two organizations swept the entire top five of the finishing order and had 6 of the top 8 finishers in general.

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Strategy

Likely a two stopper as the other two street courses were. That is honestly all dependent on how long you can make the new green tires last. For St. Pete, the fall off was expected and showed early on to be more than the red tire (it’s predecessor). However, the race pace showed differently which quickly shut the door on any sort of three stop strategy.

With a two stopper, you can split this race really into thirds.

The overcut and undercut are things to watch for strategy plays. Do you get held up on your in or even out lap? Scott McLaughlin had that happen to him coming to his final stop in St. Pete. Do you avoid the danger zone by pitting early in the pit sequence just in case a caution occurs? Does that risk not play out well meaning you’ll have older/used tires in the end?

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Favorites

Marcus Ericsson

3 of his 4 wins have come on street courses. He has 2 podiums in 2 street course races in 2023 as well. Ericsson has not finished outside the top 10 all season.

Romain Grosjean

Scored the pole for St. Pete and led a ton of laps. Was in contention to win before the late race incident while battling for the lead with Scott McLaughlin. He was runner-up in Long Beach. Andretti needs a bounceback race and this could be it.

Kyle Kirkwood

Was 4th in both St. Pete practices and made the Fast Six. He scored not only the pole in Long Beach, but the win as well. This car he’s driving nearly won this race last season in Belle Isle.

Alex Palou

Palou, would admit, that street courses used to be his Achilles Heel in this series.

“I’m really, really happy about that,” he said of his recent street course results. “Street courses, I think when I first joined INDYCAR, I just did like three races on street courses before joining INDYCAR, so I think it’s just experience and confidence. Yeah, getting more confidence every time, and hopefully we can keep on scoring good results on street courses.”

He had 3 podiums and 5 top 6’s in 5 tries on these tracks last season. This year, he was 8th in St. Pete and 5th in Long Beach. He enters having scored a top five finish in five straight races on the season too.

Scott Dixon

3rd in St. Pete and while he was last in Long Beach, he had a top five car before that incident with O’Ward. Dixon won the final two street course events a year ago. He also has five top seven finishes in six races run this year.

Pato O’Ward

2nd in St. Pete and quickest in Long Beach before bad luck in qualifying and being overly aggressive in the race derailed his weekend. He’s a past Belle Isle winner and has three runner-up finishes this season alone.

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Sleepers

Colton Herta

He’s a street course ace. Unfortunately, he also finds trouble on these tracks too. Still, Herta was 20th in St. Pete and 4th in Long Beach though too and has four top 10 finishes in the last five races on the season.

Alexander Rossi

He was one spot away (4th) from a podium finish in St. Pete and had a top 10 car in Long Beach before a late race mechanical failure. His teammate is good here and Rossi nearly won this race last year with Andretti. The momentum is building after a podium in the GMR Grand Prix and a fifth place run in the Indy 500.

Rahal/Letterman/Lanigan Racing

Sebring was the turning point last year. Graham Rahal was 4th in Toronto while Christian Lundgaard was 8th. Actually, Rahal had 3 Top-7 finishes on the 5 street courses a year ago while Lundgaard closed out the year on them with a pair of 8th place runs. They started 2023 off with a pair of top 10 finishes in St. Pete too. Rahal was 6th and 12th on street courses this season and this is the site that he last won at in 2017. Lundgaard was 9th and 14th with Harvey 22nd and 13th. After a strong GMR Grand Prix and a low in the Indy 500, watch out for a rebound on Sunday.

David Malukas

Was worth a look for a driver scoring a top 10 in St. Pete.

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Fades

Josef Newgarden

Newgarden has 4 street course wins in 4 seasons and being 16th, 1st, 4th, 10th and sixth on them last year. However, he was disappointing in St. Pete (17th) as well as Long Beach (9th).

Scott McLaughlin

He won St. Pete last year but only 13th and 10th on street courses this year. His Barber win is his only top five all year.

Will Power

7th and 6th this year on street courses. However, he won Belle Isle a year ago though too. The thing is, he only has one top five finish all season.

Meyer Shank Racing

Both were fast on Belle Isle last year. However, both have struggled in 2023 on them. Pagenaud was 26th and 15th in two starts while Castroneves was 23rd and 21st.

Felix Rosenqvist

19th and 7th on street courses in 2023.

Ed Carpenter Racing

Street courses haven’t been a strong suit for them. Conor Daly was 21st, 12th, 12th, 20th and 17th on these tracks respectively last year while Rinus VeeKay was 6th, 13th, 16th, 13th and 12th himself. They each finished outside the top 10 in St. Pete and Long Beach too.

AJ Foyt Racing

They’ve not won a race since 2013 and were 18-24-25 in St. Pete last season, 10-16-26 in Long Beach, 20-24-27 in Belle Isle, 22-24 in Toronto and 19-25 in Nashville. Benjamin Pedersen is a rookie and Santino Ferrucci is still learning the Foyt program. Pedersen was 27th and 24th on street courses this year with Ferrucci 24th and 11th.

Callum Ilott

The young driver hasn’t exceled on these types of tracks. He’s finished 19th, 24th, 14th and 15th respectively on them a year ago and also missed Belle Isle due to an injury. While he was 5th in St. Pete, he was 19th in Long Beach.

Devlin DeFrancesco

He was 22nd, 25th, 18th, 18th and 22nd in 5 street course events last season and collected in an opening lap crash this year in St. Pete and 16th in Long Beach.