A couple of NTT INDYCAR SERIES teams are eyeing the future while also hopeful of staying above a crucial cut line in points. On Monday, a couple of loose ends were tied up with Tom Blomqvist being named as the permanent replacement for Simon Pagenaud in the 60 ride for the final two races of the season and Juri Vips as the fill-in for Jack Harvey’s former ride in the No. 30 Dallara-Honda for RLL.

These two are tied for the final two spots above the cutline right now and with Blomqvist having 1 career start and 0 laps turned in race conditions (opening lap crash in Toronto), it makes Vips’ learning curve by comparison this weekend less extreme and less daunting.

So why experiment now with so much on the line? Only the top 22 in entrant points at seasons end get the bonus money and these two currently hold the final two spots. Is it worth the risk?

Not only do both teams think so, but they both also have eyes to the future endeavors too in hopes that these 2 rides aren’t in this position a year from now.

Blomqvist was already named as 1 of the 2 drivers for MSR a year from now. He knows he’ll be here.

Plus, I think it also shows that maybe Linus Lundqvist isn’t a part of their future for 2024 either. Rumor is that he’s heading to another team in the paddock for next season so I can see MSR not wanting to give that said team seat time for their driver. Why would they?

Why not just go ahead and put Blomqvist in this ride and off you go?

“I’ve got to thank Jim (Meyer) and Mike (Shank) for getting me in the car and looking ahead now to next season having been confirmed to drive with MSR next year,” Blomqvist said this week via a team release. “It’s a good thing to be getting these races under my belt before the season and working in preparation for my full program in 2024. I got a brief test in Toronto under very challenging circumstances – without any real preparation whatsoever.

“Now I’ve got a little bit more understanding and knowledge and I’m hoping it’s going to be easier this time. I’m going to have the opportunity to get into the simulator and I know a little bit more of what to expect in terms of the way the weekend runs. I don’t know Portland at all and I know everyone has been racing flat-out in the summer. It’s still going to be an absolutely huge challenge. The series is so, so competitive and I am still new to these cars. I’m not putting any pressure on myself and I’m just going to go out there and do my best. Hopefully I can do Mike and Jim proud and make progress with every session. Hopefully after these next two events I can be happy and put in some strong performances and go into winter break with more knowledge on the series and be able to build on this.”

For Vips, Conor Daly did his part in Gateway to get this ride above the water (-2 entering, +1 leaving) and despite no starts here before, he’s been around the team for almost a year now learning behind the scenes and waiting in the shadows for this moment.

“To be honest, I haven’t,” Vips told me if he has any nerves or trepidation on making his first start in a race in over a year. “Maybe once I get there I’ll start feeling them, but at the moment there is almost no — there’s excitement, obviously, because I just haven’t been in a car for so long, and I haven’t raced for so long.

“But nerves are almost zero at this stage because I have so much to prepare and so much to do with media and with the engineers, simulators, and stuff. It’s organizing all of that that’s on my mind now, so it’s almost like I feel like I don’t have time to be nervous at the moment.

“I think that might change once I get to the track obviously because it has been a while, and it’s such a competitive series, so yeah we’ll need to do well.”

Vips comes with baggage so for RLL to take this risk, well it’s saying how much RLL values his talents. They could have anyone for this seat. It’s a paid ride. However, Bobby Rahal feels Vips has a value and the talent to compete here.

“Yuri came up on our radar screen by a friend of mine in Europe,” Bobby Rahal told me. “Of course, this was after the mistake that he made, after it was public, after he was released from his Red Bull contract.

“So he was kind of — although the team that he drove for knew him well, and they certainly believed that, yes, it was a mistake, but that was not emblematic of him as a person, and they still ran him the remainder of that year. That was the Hitech team.

“Anyway, I spoke to some friends that had worked with Yuri, and they were just very unbelievably impressed and supportive of him, with his skills. Knowing that, I know that, as I said earlier, also Yuri had already gone through diversity training in London with Dr. Lateesha Osbourne.

“I think he knew there was a lot more to do beyond that even, but we felt that certainly all the response we were getting from people who had been with him was very positive.

“Obviously sad that he made a mistake of this nature, and he paid a huge price for it, I might add, but was impressed because he set about correcting that and learning from that and continues to this day.

“So as I said, the opinions I got about him as a driver were extremely high, and he did do that test for us, and we were quite pleased with it at Sebring.

“So I guess I personally feel and I think Mike Lanigan, our team, feels that everybody makes mistakes, and you have to do what you can to repair and learn from those mistakes, but everybody deserves a second chance. I certainly feel strongly about that, so that’s why he is here.”

Vips actually drove an Indy car for the first time on October 12, 2022 at Sebring International Raceway in a test for the team and again at Barber Motorsports Park on March 13, 2023. He has also performed static simulator testing for the team during the season as well.

“I’m super happy to get the opportunity with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing and very thankful to Bobby, Mike and everyone at the team,” Vips said. “I haven’t been driving all year so the anticipation for this opportunity has been immense but I’m really looking forward to starting again. We tested together at the end of 2022 in Sebring and it seemed like we just gelled. I got along with everyone and I really like the atmosphere at the team. Bobby’s also one to give second chances and I’m extremely grateful that he is giving me one and I really hope to bring a good result for him, Mike and the whole team.”

Vips is also stepping into a nice situation in that RLL’s best tracks this season have been on natural road courses. Between that and being emersed in the team already, this could be an easier transition period.

“I hope I can prove myself and most importantly get them into the Winners Circle, which is always my main mission,” Vips said. “I feel ready for these races, I think the tracks suit my experience and driving style and the car as well. I’ve already integrated myself with the team this year, doing some work for them on the simulator so I already know the people and feel very comfortable with everyone which is a big benefit for me as well.”

The thing is, he’s also not seen these next 2 tracks before, which makes them tough to honestly prepare for.

“There is not much you can do other than simulation and look at data so that’s what I’ve been doing. I’ve been making sure that I will be as ready as I can to race. Obviously, I’ve only done two test days in the last 10 months so I haven’t done a lot of driving so that is definitely going to limit me but I’m doing absolutely everything I can to get as good of a result as possible.”

With 5 of the bottom 6 overall in the standings being rookies, with 4 of the 6 being on the outside looking in, why not make these moves ahead of time? They’re learning together and it’s not like someone is stepping in and using veteran experience to beat them.

“Well, I think there’s a couple of things about these next two events,” Rahal told me. “One that I think is a real value to us is the series test at Laguna Seca on Thursday before the race. So it’s more than just getting time at the two events themselves, but it’s getting a full day at Laguna in advance of the race.

“I think the amount of knowledge and comfort and everything that a driver needs to do his best, I think that is going to help that process a lot.

“I think Portland, that’s going to be a challenge, there’s no question about it, because you don’t have that much practice time before you go into qualifying. As we all know, qualifying is so intense and so close.

“I mean, you don’t have to be far off the pace, and you could be in the last one-third of the grid, so I do think there’s going to be a lot of demands this coming weekend.

“But having the two races weekend-to-weekend, having the test day, to me all of that made a lot of sense. And, of course, Yuri is from the road racing background, so going to an oval, especially an oval like St. Louis, would have been really I think an unbelievable experience never having done one before.

“But I would also say that I thought Conor did a super job for us this last weekend and really was very appreciative of his efforts. A real pro. So when we had three races to go, we just felt that that was the best solution to those three races.”

Vips likes what he sees in IndyCar and is hopeful this is just the beginning.

“I really like it so much,” he told me. “When you come to a race weekend, it’s just such a different atmosphere. Like, the paddock is very open. The fans get to see the cars, see the drivers, be really close to them. Be like — I don’t know how to say — maybe immersed, I think, in the experience much more.

“Yeah, the racing is awesome. That’s one side that I really like about it. You get such close racing. It’s very hard here, but when you watch the races, they’re super exciting.

“So, yeah, that’s the appeal I have for INDYCAR, and yeah, I think it’s just an awesome series.”

Agustin Canapino dropped from +5 to -1 with being 22nd while Devlin DeFrancesco’s 19th place result had him go from -3 to -4.

Standings With 2 Races Left

14. No. 15 RLL Honda +85

15. No. 21 ECR Chevy +78

16. No. 18 DCR Honda +71

17. No. 77 JHR Chevy +62

18. No. 14 Foy Chevy +28

19. No. 06 MSR Honda +25

20. No. 20 ECR Chevy +11

21. No. 60 MSR Honda +1

22. No. 30 RLL Honda +1

23. No. 78 JHR Chevy -1

24. No. 29 Andretti Honda -4

25. No. 51 DCR Honda -38

26. No. 55 Foyt Chevy -53