Points Battle

We’re five races into the 2023 season and the top of the standings is a tight one. Christian Rasmussen leads Nolan Siegel by just two points entering Sunday’s race (11 a.m. ET, Peacock, INDYCAR Radio Network) at Road America.

Siegel qualified fourth while Rasmussen in three spots behind in seventh.

Right now, the battle is between these two for the championship.

Rasmussen has four top five finishes in five races including a win in Barber and runner-up in the second Detroit race.

Siegel has only three top five finishes but in the race that he has, he won Detroit and was runner-up at both St. Pete and Barber.

Rasmussen won this race a year ago and if you go back to the final two races of the 2022 season in general, he has four top two finishes in his last seven starts. However, starting where he is, it could be difficult to go back-to-back in Road America.

---

Where’s Andretti?

HMD won 5 of the 1st 6 races last season, but it was this point a year ago, that Andretti Autosport turned it on. They’d go 1-2-3 in this race which helped propel them to 6 wins over the final 8 races to the season.

This season, it’s looked more of the same.

HMD has won 4 of the first 5 races while Andretti has been shut out. Can they flip the script at this moment during this race weekend for the second consecutive year?

So far, it’s not been like last season. They only qualified P5 (Foster), P9 (Chadwick), P10 (Roe) and P13 (McElrea).

McElrea was third a year ago here and has scored a top seven finish in all but one race run this season. He’s finished fourth in 2 of the last 3 races but being back in 13th is a massive detriment.

Louis Foster has three finishes of 14th, 14th and 19th in five races, but was also second at Indy and third in Detroit for a pair of podiums in his last three starts too.

James Roe Jr. has four straight top 10’s while Jamie Chadwick is still searching for her first top 10.

---

New Winner?

It seems like this season is still wide open. We’re 5 races into the season with 5 different winners. In fact, the last three races were first time winners at that. Do we see the seasons first repeat winner on Sunday or does the parity continue?

The front row has never won a race before. Kyffin Simpson is 0-for-19 with just one career podium. Colin Kaminsky is 0-for-5 with a best finish of sixth.

Row 2 is the the last two winners Reece Gold and Nolan Siegel.

Gold (Detroit 1 winner) has just one other top 10 all season and that came in the season opener at St. Pete.

Siegel (Detroit 2 winner) is rookie here but has three top two finishes in five races run in 2023.

All 14 race winners at Road America came from a top four starting spot in the race itself including 11 from the front row. In saying that, just three of the 11 were from the pole though too. 8 times has the second placed starter won and twice from the fourth-place starter. The inside of the row (pole, 3rd) has won the other four.

Danial Frost (St. Pete winner) was eighth here a year ago and hasn’t had a podium since his season opening win. He starts eighth on Sunday.

Christian Rasmussen (Barber winner) is the defending race winner. He starts seventh.

Matteo Nannnini (Indy winner) is a rookie and that win is his only top 10 all season. He rolls off 12th.

Rasmussen and Siegel look the part to pick up a second win in 2023. McElrea would have been a prime candidate to win but he starts 13th instead.

Juncos, Andretti and HMD have won the last six races here as well and have 4 of the top 5 starting spots.

---

Weekend Schedule

Friday:

2:50-3:35 pm: Practice

Saturday:

9:50-10:35 am: Practice

1:15 pm: Qualifying

Sunday:

11:02 am: Drivers To Cars

11:10 pm: Command

11:15 pm: Race (20 laps or 55 minutes)