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| IndyCar runs two races at Road America this weekend |
Coverage
Time: Coverage begins at 5:00 p.m. ET on Saturday July 11th with green flag scheduled for 5:15 p.m. ET. On Sunday July 12th, coverage begins at noon ET with green flag scheduled for 12:42 p.m. ET.
Channel: NBC
Announcers: Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy will be in the booth. Dave Burns and James Hinchcliffe will work pit lane.
IndyCar Weekend Schedule
Saturday:
Practice: 11:30 a.m. ET (45 minutes)*
Qualifying: 2:15 p.m. ET (NBCSN will have live coverage of this session)
Race: 5:15 p.m. ET (55 laps)
Sunday:
Qualifying: 10:00 a.m. ET*
Race: 12:42 p.m. ET (55 laps)
* - All practice and qualifying sessions are available live with the NBC Sports Gold IndyCar pass.
It's Now or Never for Rossi...
A pair of mechanical issues in the first two rounds sees Alexander Rossi in an unfamiliar position in his IndyCar career.
Rossi sits 23rd in the championship, on 20 points, after an electrical glitch at Texas cost him eighth on the grid and forced an early drive-through penalty and fuel pressure issues knocked him out at halfway of the Grand Prix of Indianapolis.
This is the worst championship position of Rossi's five-year IndyCar career. Prior to the start of the 2020 season, he had been in the top five of the championship for 34 consecutive races and the top ten of the championship for 47 consecutive races. Rossi had a 43-race consecutive finish streak, seven away from matching Danica Patrick's record, prior to his retirement on Independence Day.
Sitting 84 points behind championship leader Scott Dixon, Rossi returns to the site of his most recent victory and the track he most recently led at, Road America. From second on the grid, Rossi smacked the field on the 4.048-mile road course, leading 54 of 55 laps and having a margin of victory of 28.439 seconds. Replicating that 2019 performance twice this weekend could drag Rossi back into the pack and keep his championship from dying before we even get to the halfway point of this abbreviated schedule.
While dazzling everyone last year, Road America has not been the kindest track to Rossi. He was mid-pack for the entirety of the 2016 race before finishing 15th. In 2017, he attempted to go off-strategy and it was working before a front wing failured forced an extra stop for a change. In 2018, he started fourth, but camber shims fell out of his right front tire and forced him to make an unscheduled pit stop.
Another cause for uncertainty is Rossi has not shown blistering speed in 2020. At Texas, he was 16th in practice before qualifying eighth for a race he spent almost the entirety a lap down. At the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, he was one position better in practice in 15th and got out of group two by the skin of his teeth before ending up 11th on the grid. He was running in the top ten prior to his fuel pressure issue dropping him from the race.
Rossi sits 23rd in the championship, on 20 points, after an electrical glitch at Texas cost him eighth on the grid and forced an early drive-through penalty and fuel pressure issues knocked him out at halfway of the Grand Prix of Indianapolis.
This is the worst championship position of Rossi's five-year IndyCar career. Prior to the start of the 2020 season, he had been in the top five of the championship for 34 consecutive races and the top ten of the championship for 47 consecutive races. Rossi had a 43-race consecutive finish streak, seven away from matching Danica Patrick's record, prior to his retirement on Independence Day.
Sitting 84 points behind championship leader Scott Dixon, Rossi returns to the site of his most recent victory and the track he most recently led at, Road America. From second on the grid, Rossi smacked the field on the 4.048-mile road course, leading 54 of 55 laps and having a margin of victory of 28.439 seconds. Replicating that 2019 performance twice this weekend could drag Rossi back into the pack and keep his championship from dying before we even get to the halfway point of this abbreviated schedule.
While dazzling everyone last year, Road America has not been the kindest track to Rossi. He was mid-pack for the entirety of the 2016 race before finishing 15th. In 2017, he attempted to go off-strategy and it was working before a front wing failured forced an extra stop for a change. In 2018, he started fourth, but camber shims fell out of his right front tire and forced him to make an unscheduled pit stop.
Another cause for uncertainty is Rossi has not shown blistering speed in 2020. At Texas, he was 16th in practice before qualifying eighth for a race he spent almost the entirety a lap down. At the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, he was one position better in practice in 15th and got out of group two by the skin of his teeth before ending up 11th on the grid. He was running in the top ten prior to his fuel pressure issue dropping him from the race.
Rossi will have to come out of the gate strong. Since Road America is a doubleheader, the qualifying format will not be the three-round Fast Six format, but the two-group format where the fastest car takes pole position and the rest of that grid fills the odd-numbered positions. The fastest car in the other group will start second and the rest of the cars will occupy the even-numbered positions.
... and Power
Rossi is in a deep hole but only six positions and 11 points better is Will Power.
This is another grinding start for Power. For the third time in four seasons he has failed to pick up a top five finish in one of the first two races. This year, a pair of botched pit stop has sunk Power. At Texas, a poor change on the right rear tire dropped him from a possible top five to 13th and at Indianapolis, the lone caution caught him out before his second start and shuffled him to the middle of the field. He was working his way up the order before he stalled on his final stop and any hope of a charge into the top five in the closing laps evaporated, leaving Power with 20th.
This is the fourth consecutive season he has failed to finish in the top ten of the second race of this season. In Power's first 11 seasons, his worst finish in the second race of the season was eighth and he won the second race three times with eight podium finishes.
After finishing third in the 2019 season opener, Power was 24th with a broken driveshaft at Austin and 11th at Barber. In 2017, he started the year with finishes of 19th, 13th and 14th. Worst of all, the slow starts have not stopped with the third round of the season. In 2018, he started with finishes of tenth, 22nd, second and 21st. He has not won one of the first four races of the season since he won the 2014 season opener at St. Petersburg.
For three of the last five seasons, Power's first victory was the fifth race. On all three occasions, the fifth race was the Grand Prix of Indianapolis.
Power's Road America result have been strong of late, but a few duds raise eyebrows. Power won the 2016 race from pole position, leading 46 of 50 laps and he was fifth in 2017 and runner-up last year. In his Road America debut in 2006, an off-course excursion dropped him off the lead lap and finished 13th. A gearbox problem ended his race after 25 laps the following year. In 2018, Power lost a header coming to the green flag and left him dead last in 23rd.
Qualifying will not be a worry for Power. He has started in the top three in last five trips to the track and his worst starting position was seventh.
One thing to worry about is Power is not strong in doubleheader weekends. In Power's career, he has participated in 12 doubleheader weekends. In only four of those did he finish in the top ten of both races. At Texas in 2011, he was third and first in the Twin 275s. He won the first Belle Isle race in 2014 and was runner-up the next day. Later in 2014, he was ninth at Toronto in race one and third in race two. In 2018, he was seventh and second in the Belle Isle races.
Prior to 2020, Belle Isle had been the only track to host a doubleheader since 2015 and, outside of 2018, Power has finished 18th or worse in one of those races each year. Of course, in the other race he has finished fourth or better including at least one podium finish in the last four seasons.
Dixon vs. Pagenaud
Only two races are in the bag, but the 2020 season is shaping up to be a Scott Dixon vs. Simon Pagenaud battle for 14 races. Both drivers have finished on the podium of both races. Dixon holds the advantage with two victories and 104 of a maximum 108 points from these opening two rounds. This has Dixon 29 points clear of Pagenaud with the Frenchman picking up a second and a third.
Dixon had never won the first two races of a season prior to this season and he has finished in the top five of the last three Road America races. Last year's race saw Dixon overcome a spin in turn five on lap one. Without aid of a caution, Dixon drove from dead last to fifth. Dating back to last season, Dixon has seven podium finishes from his last nine races.
The ever-consistent Pagenaud rivals Dixon's streak. Dating back to last year, Pagenaud has 11 consecutive top ten finishes with seven of those being top five results. With Rossi's retirement last Saturday, Pagenaud is now the active leader in consecutive finishes, having seen the checkered flag in the last 33 races.
Dixon holds the upper hand over Pagenaud heading to Elkhart Lake. On top of his three consecutive top five finishes, he was fifth on debut in 2001. Pagenaud has one top five finishes in five starts at the track and his starting position and finishing positions have been trending in the wrong direction the last three years. Since starting and finishing fourth in 2017, Pagenaud has failed to make it out of the first round of qualifying the last two years and that has brought his finish down to seventh and ninth in 2018 and 2019 respectively. Dixon has started in the top ten of nine consecutive races.
With the driving styles of Dixon and Pagenaud, this could be a knockout, anything you can do I can do better fight for 14 races. Neither driver makes many mistakes and neither driver has many off days.
Who is Happy to See Two?
With this shaken up 2020 schedule, Road America finds itself with an extra race and that will put a grin on a handful of faces.
Josef Newgarden's second title defense has started off respectably with a third at Texas from pole position and a seventh at Indianapolis, but he is 40 points behind Dixon after two races. Newgarden has been superb at Road America. He has top ten finishes in all four races, including a drive from 20th to eighth in his Elkhart Lake debut in 2016 with a broken clavicle, a result that almost certainly sealed his fate as a Penske driver. In the last three years, Newgarden has started on one of the first two rows and has finished on the podium. He won the 2018 race from pole position, leading 53 of 55 laps.
Like Newgarden, Graham Rahal has finished in the top ten in every one of his trips to Road America and his worst finish is eighth. Rahal has an impressive qualifying record to go with it, having started no worse than ninth and having started on row two or row three in four of his starts. The one thing Rahal is lacking is a victory and he has led only three laps out of 268 circuits around the famed road courses. Though only two races old, Rahal sits fifth in the championship, 50 points behind Dixon. Since going to the finale with a shot at the title in 2015, Rahal has not put together a strong championship effort, but 2020 has set the Ohioan on a promising trajectory.
In 2019, the rookies took to Road America well. Colton Herta won pole position and spent much of the race in a podium position. A costly strategy choice of starting and ending the race on the alternate tire cost him and dropped him from potentially being on the podium to eighth. While Herta dropped, Felix Rosenqvist ascended up the order, driving from 18th to sixth.
The difference between this year's sophomores is Herta sits fourth in the championship, 46 points off Dixon while Rosenqvist coughed up a runner-up finish at Texas, and instead of sitting on Herta's heels, the Swede is 19th in the championship on 25 points. This weekend could see Herta firm his position in the championship while Rosenqvist needs to make up ground after losing valuable points in race one.
Who Could Have a Long Weekend?
While some drivers should be thrilled with two Road America races, there are drivers at the other end of the perspective.
Zach Veach finds himself sixth in the championship, 54 points behind Dixon, after finishes of fourth and 14th, but Road America has not been kind to him. Veach has been pretty average with qualifying results of 11th and 14th, but in each race he has finished off the lead lap with finishes of 22nd and 18th. Road America was not always this fickle to Veach. He won at the track in Indy Lights in 2016 and was third in the other race held at the track.
Natural-terrain road courses have not been Veach's forte in IndyCar. Only once has he finished in the top ten at a natural-terrain road course and that was tenth at Mid-Ohio in 2018. His average finish on this disciple is 17.2667 in 15 career starts. He has finished outside the top twenty on five occasions and outside the top fifteen on nine occasions.
Marco Andretti had another frustrating weekend on the IMS road course. After showing potential of advancing from round one of qualifying, Andretti had an off and that forced him to start on the final row of the grid. In the race, he finished 22nd. In four Road America starts, his best finish is 11th and last year he retired after 18 laps due to an electrical issue.
Andretti has not had a top ten finish on a natural-terrain road course since sixth at Austin last year. His most recent top five finish was fifth at Sonoma in 2018. His last podium finish on a natural-terrain road course was second at Barber in 2014. He has only two other podium finishes on natural-terrain road courses, his first career victory at Sonoma in 2006 and third at Motegi in 2011.
The Grand Prix of Indianapolis showed A.J. Foyt Racing still has some progress to make on road courses. Charlie Kimball and Dalton Kellett started 24th and 26th respectively. Kimball climbed up to 18th and Kellett finished 21st on debut. Foyt had an atrocious qualifying record last year. Matheus Leist failed to start in the top ten of any races. On road and street courses, Leist started on row ten or worse in ten of 12 races. Tony Kanaan's record was worse. Kanaan started on row ten or worse in 11 of 12 road/street course races. The lone exception was starting 18th for the second Belle Isle race.
Kimball may be able to pull the team out of the muck. He was sixth in his first two Road America starts but his recent qualifying form is uninspiring. He has not started in the top ten in 18 of his last 24 road/street course races. Five of those top ten starts came back in 2017 when Kimball drove for Ganassi.
Kellett never finished in the top five at Road America in 11 Road to Indy starts.
Doubleheader Trends
IndyCar has held 12 doubleheaders since it was re-introduced during 2011. This will be the first doubleheaders held on a natural-terrain road course since the Dan Gurney 200 at Seattle International Raceway (now known as Pacific Raceways) on October 19, 1969. Mario Andretti and Al Unser split that weekend.
Since 2011, there has been the Twin 275s at Texas in 2011, doubleheaders at Belle Isle, Toronto and Houston in 2013 and 2014 and since 2015, Belle Isle was the only doubleheader on the schedule.
In those 12 doubleheaders, there have been two sweeps, Scott Dixon at Toronto in 2013 and Graham Rahal at Belle Isle in 2017.
In the ten doubleheaders that were not sweeps for a driver, only once has a team swept the weekend. Team Penske swept the 2014 Belle Isle races with Will Power and Hélio Castroneves.
Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing have each won six races on doubleheader weekends. KV Racing won three races on doubleheader weekends. Andretti Autosport, Dale Coyne Racing, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing and Arrow McLaren SP have each two victories on these weekends. Ed Carpenter Racing has one victory.
Dale Coyne Racing has only won the first race of a weekend and each time Dale Coyne Racing won race one, Arrow McLaren SP won race two the next day. Of course, both times that happened Simon Pagenaud was driving for the team formerly known as Schmidt Peterson Hamilton Motorsports.
Four of Ganassi's victories have come in race one of a weekend while four of Penske's victories have come in race two.
The first race of the last five doubleheaders have seen five different teams take victory. The second race of the last seven doubleheaders have had seven different teams take victory.
Scott Dixon leads all drivers with five victories during doubleheader weekends. Will Power is next with four victories and Sébastien Bourdais scored three victories. Mike Conway, Simon Pagenaud and Graham Rahal each have won twice during doubleheader weekends. Dario Franchitti, Hélio Castroneves, Carlos Huertas, Carlos Muñoz, Alexander Rossi and Josef Newgarden each have one victory.
In seven of 12 doubleheaders, the winner of race two started worse than the starting position of the race one winner. In only two of those weekends did the first race winner start on pole position. In the other five, the race two winner started outside the top five.
In the five weekends where the race one winner had the worst starting position, four of those winners started outside the top ten with three of them starting outside the top fifteen.
Only three times has the winners of both races started in the top five. Two of those were the sweeps and the other was the Twin 275s at Texas, where the second race grid was decided via a draw. In zero of 12 weekends has the race winner started in the same position for each race.
Seven of 12 weekends have seen more cautions in race two than race one. Only once has there been the same number of cautions in each race.
Only one of the 24 races have gone caution-free. That was the second race of the Twin 275s in 2011. Seven races have had more than five cautions while eight races have had two cautions or fewer.
Road to Indy
After a massive delay, the Road to Indy seasons start this weekend from Road America. This year will see only the Indy Pro 2000 and U.S. F2000 seasons contested. The Indy Lights season has been cancelled.
Indy Pro 2000 and U.S. F2000 have seen heavily revised scheduled. Both series starts this weekend with a doubleheader and will run standalone triple-headers at Mid-Ohio on July 29-30. Both series will run a doubleheader at Mid-Ohio during the IndyCar weekend on August 7-9.
Indy Pro 2000 will run two oval races, the Freedom 90 from Indianapolis Raceway Park on August 22 and a race at Gateway on August 29. U.S. F2000 will run the Freedom 75 from IRP on the same day but U.S. F2000 will not go to Gateway, the only difference between the two schedules.
On September 3-4, there will be another pair of standalone triple-headers, this time at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course. The final three rounds for each series will be doubleheaders and will take place with the IndyCar rounds at Portland on September 11-13, Laguna Seca on September 18-20 and the St. Petersburg finale on October 23-25.
Braden Eves will run with Exclusive Autosport after winning the 2019 U.S. F2000 championship and his main rival from last season, Hunter McElrea will drive for Pabst Racing with Colin Kaminsky as his teammate.
The top returning driver from the 2019 Indy Pro 2000 seasons is Parker Thompson. Thompson was third in the championship last year and the Canadian has moved to DEForce Racing, his third team in as many Indy Pro 2000 seasons. Moisés de la Vara, Kory Enders and Manuel Sulaimán will be Thompson's teammates.
Sting Ray Robb is at Juncos Racing with Artem Petrov and Nate Aranda. Phillippe Denes was the standout performer in the Road to Indy iRacing series, winning both championships and eight of 15 races. Denes will drive for RP Motorsports USA, which produced last year's drivers' champion Kyle Kirkwood. Swede Lucas Petersson joins Denes.
There have been some new entries to the Indy Pro 2000 grid since the false start of the 2020 season in March. Danial Frost will return after initially being set to drive in Indy Lights with Andretti Autosport. Frost will drive for Turn 3 Motorsport with Antoine Comeau. Frost won twice and stood on six podiums in 2019.
Andretti Autosport returns to Indy Pro 2000, in partnership with George Michael Steinbrenner IV and Canadian Devlin DeFrancesco will be the team's driver. DeFrancesco has spent the last four years in Europe, running various junior series. He was third in the 2017 Euroformula Open championship and spent the last two years in GP3/Formula Three without much success, failing to score a point in either series. He has also been an endurance driver for JDC-Miller Motorsports the last year and finished fifth in the 24 Hours of Daytona in January.
The Road to Indy series held a test at Mid-Ohio on June 29 ahead of this delayed season.
Frost led the Indy Pro 2000 test ahead of Robb and Thompson. Sulaimán and DeFrancesco rounded out the top five with Comeau in sixth. Eves participated in the test, but transponder issues kept him from registering official lap times. Unofficially, Eves set some quick times at the test.
Sabré Cook was not at the test, but she will be at Road America driving for BN Racing w/ Team Benik. Her teammate will be Jacob Loomis. Bob Kaminsky will be in a third Pabst Racing entry and Charles Finelli is back with FatBoy Racing!
Seventeen cars are entered for the Indy Pro 2000 opener.
Both Indy Pro 2000 races will be run on Friday July 10 at 1:15 p.m. ET and 4:30 p.m. ET.
In the U.S. F2000 Mid-Ohio test, Cape Motorsports took the top three times with Michael d'Orlando leading the way ahead of Josh Green and Kyle Dupell. Jack William Miller was fourth in a Miller Vinatieri Motorsports entry before Reece Gold rounded out the top five in Cape Motorsports' fourth car.
Jay Howard Driver Development had the next three fastest times with Nolan Siegel ahead of Christian Rasmussen and Wyatt Brichacek. Christian Brooks and Matt Round-Garrido rounded out the top ten driving for Exclusive Autosport and Pabst Racing respectively.
Other notable test participants include Lucas Oil School of Racing scholarship winner Prescott Campbell for Exclusive Autosport and last year's IRP winner Cameron Shields for Legacy Autosport.
Notable absences from the Mid-Ohio test include Pabst Racing drivers Yuven Sundaramoorthy and Eduardo Barrichello. Jay Howard Driver Development has entered a fifth car for Bijoy Garg. DEForce Racing will have two cars for Nico Christodoulou and Kiko Porto. Exclusive Autosport has entered Josh Pierson and Christian Brooks alongside Campbell.
Twenty-one cars are opened for U.S. F2000's first round.
Like Indy Pro 2000, U.S. F2000 will run both races on Friday July 10. The first race will be at 12:15 p.m. ET with race two at 3:30 p.m. ET.
Fast Facts
Saturday's race will be the fifth IndyCar race held on July 11 and first since Sébastien Bourdais won at Toronto in 2004.
The Saturday race will fall on the 21st anniversary of Christian Fittipaldi's first career IndyCar victory, which came at Road America. Fittipaldi won from fourth on the grid ahead of Newman-Haas Racing teammate Michael Andretti. Fittipaldi led the final seven laps after Juan Pablo Montoya retired with a broken gearbox while leading.
Sunday's race will be the seventh IndyCar race held on July 12 and first since Sébastien Bourdais won at Milwaukee in 2015. That was the most recent IndyCar race held at Milwaukee.
The Sunday race will fall on the 12th anniversary of Scott Dixon's third consecutive victory at Nashville in a rain-shortened race. It is IndyCar's most recent race held at Nashville SuperSpeedway.
Scott Dixon could become the fifth driver to open a season with three consecutive victories. A.J. Foyt was the first to do it in 1964 when Foyt won the first seven races. Al Unser did it in 1971, sweeping the doubleheader in Rafaela, Argentina and then winning at Phoenix. Paul Tracy did it in 2003 with victories at St. Petersburg, Monterrey and Long Beach. Sébastien Bourdais won the first four races in 2006 at Long Beach, Houston, Monterrey and Milwaukee.
Only Al Unser in 1971 failed to win the championship after winning the first three races.
Foyt and Bourdais are the only drivers to open a season with four consecutive victories.
The average starting position for a Road America winner is 3.5172 with a median of third.
The last five Road America races have been won from a top-three starting position and the last six races have been won from a top-five starting position.
The pole-sitter has won at Road America ten times.
Only five of 29 Road America races have been won from outside the top five. Héctor Rebaque won the first Road America race from ninth in 1982. Dario Franchitti won the 1998 races from sixth on the grid. In 2000, Paul Tracy won from seventh position. The following year, Bruno Junqueira won a rain-shortened race from tenth position. The only Road America race won from outside the top ten was in 2004, when Alex Tagliani won from 13th.
Seven times has Road America produced a first-time winner, Rebaque in 1982, Uncle Jacques Villeneuve in 1985, Jacques Villeneuve in 1994, Dario Franchitti in 1998, Fittipaldi in 1999, Junqueira in 2001 and Tagliani in 2004.
The average number of lead changes in a Road America race is 3.931 with a median of three.
The most lead changes in a Road America race was 11 in 1983. Two other races have had at least ten lead changes, 1982 and 2000.
Fifteen of 29 Road America races have had three lead changes or fewer.
Three Road America races have featured no lead changes, 1987 with Mario Andretti taking the victory, 1993 with Paul Tracy taking the victory and 2003 with Bruno Junqueira taking the victory. The 2003 race was shortened to 34 laps due to weather and darkness.
The average number of cautions in a Road America race is 2.0356 with a median of two. The average number of caution laps is 6.535 with a median of 4.5.
The last two Road America races have gone caution-free and 11 total Road America races have not seen a caution.
The most cautions in a Road America race is six and that has happened on four occasions, 1995, 1997, 2001 and 2006. The most caution laps in a race was 21 in 2001.
Possible Milestones:
Scott Dixon is two victories away from becoming the third driver in IndyCar history to reach 50 victories.
Will Power is two victories away from tying Al Unser for fifth all-time on 39 victories.
Ryan Hunter-Reay is two victories away from becoming the 22nd driver in IndyCar history to reach 20 victories.
Will Power is two pole positions away from becoming the second driver in IndyCar history to reach 60 pole positions.
Ryan Hunter-Reay needs to lead 55 laps to reach the 1,600 laps led milestone.
Conor Daly needs to lead 28 laps to reach the 100 laps led milestone.
Felix Rosenqvist needs to lead 29 laps to reach the 100 laps led milestone.
Predictions
Colton Herta and Josef Newgarden split the weekend. Neither will win from pole position. Both will lead at least 45 laps. Scott Dixon's championship lead will remain consistent to what it is entering the weekend. Will Power, Felix Rosenqvist and Alexander Rossi will all pick up top five finishes but only one of them will be in the top five for both races. In each race, there will be one driver starting in the top ten that will have a career-best Road America starting position. There will be more cautions in the Saturday race than the Sunday race. There will be at least one Honda that has a mechanical/electrical problem. All three rookies will get a top ten finish this weekend. Sleeper: Marcus Ericsson.
