Track Walk: Laguna Seca 2021

The IndyCar championship battle enters Laguna Seca

The 15th and penultimate round of the 2021 NTT IndyCar Series season brings IndyCar back to Laguna Seca, another venue returning to the schedule after the COVID-19 pandemic knocked it off the calendar last year. Four different drivers have won the last four IndyCar races, but all four of those drivers have come from two teams: Chip Ganassi Racing and Team Penske. Ganassi and Penske has combined to win every race this summer after the season started with five different teams winning the first six races. Team Penske has six Laguna Seca victories, the most all-time. Ganassi has two victories at the track. Like Portland last week, the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey will be five laps longer this year, jumping up to 95 laps. 

Coverage
Time: Coverage begins at 3:00 pm ET on Sunday September 19 with green flag scheduled for 3:30 p.m. ET.
Channel: NBCSN
Announcers: Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy will be in the booth. Kevin Lee and Kelli Stavast will work pit lane.

IndyCar Weekend Schedule 
Friday:

First Practice: 5:30 p.m. ET (45 minutes)*

Saturday:

Second Practice: 1:45 p.m ET (45 minutes)*

Qualifying: 5:05 p.m. ET (NBCSN will have tape-delayed coverage at 11:30 p.m. ET)*

Sunday:
Warm-Up: 12:00 p.m. ET (30 minutes)

Race: 3:30 p.m. ET (95 laps)

* - All practice and qualifying sessions are available live on Peacock.

Championship Picture

With two races and 108 points remaining, five drivers are left in the championship battle and the key number is 49, as in any driver hoping to have a shot at the championship next week in the Long Beach season finale has to be within 49 points of the championship leader. The keynote is while the championship has gone to the wire in 15 consecutive seasons in the IRL/IndyCar Series, with the finale awarding normal points and not being double points, there is a chance the Astor Cup could be claimed before the teams depart Northern California.

Álex Palou enters with a 25-point lead over Patricio O'Ward and if Palou doubles his lead, he will clinch the 2021 IndyCar championship a race early, as all he would have to do is start the Long Beach race to claim the trophy. We have not seen an early champion since Dan Wheldon in 2005, and Wheldon clinched that title with two races to go. 

Palou is coming off his third victories of the season, the first driver to three victories this season. A maximum points day for Palou, would lift him to 531 points and for any driver to remain championship-eligible he would need 483 points after Laguna Seca, as Palou would own the tiebreaker with four victories and no other driver could have more than three. 

With a maximum points Palou victory, O'Ward would need to finish fourth or better or finish fifth with at least one bonus point. Josef Newgarden currently sits on 443 points, 34 points behind Palou. If Palou scored maximum points, Newgarden would need to finish second to remain alive. 

A maximum points victory for Palou would automatically eliminate his Chip Ganassi Racing teammates Scott Dixon and Marcus Ericsson.

The championship lead has swapped hands after the last two races and Palou retook the top position after a 35-point swing in Portland. After two races where Palou scored only 15 combined points, he picked up 52 points with his Portland victory. He has scored more than 30 points in eight of 14 races this season. Meanwhile, O'Ward ended up 14th after misplaying pit strategy and struggling on the primary tire compound. It was the third time O'Ward has finished outside the top ten this season. However, O'Ward has finished in the top five of each race following those non-top ten results. 

Newgarden is teetering on championship eligibility. A good day could bring him back in the thick of it and there is still an outside chance Newgarden could leave Laguna Seca as the championship leader. He has five consecutive top ten finishes, which include two victories and a fifth. While he lost 11 points to the championship leader after Portland, he has gained 70 points to the championship leader since his Mid-Ohio victory, where he was 104 points off the top spot after his first victory of the season. 

Scott Dixon's hopes for a successful title defense rest on gaining points on his teammate Palou. Dixon sits perched on the fence of life or death, 49 points back. If Palou outscores Dixon by one point at Laguna Seca, Dixon's title hopes are done. If the two drivers score the same number of points, Dixon's title hopes are still done as he could only finish level with Palou and Palou would own the tiebreaker. Dixon must outscore Palou by one point at Laguna Seca to remain alive. 

The third Chip Ganassi Racing driver still alive for the championship, Marcus Ericsson, has some work to do to remain in the fight. Sitting 75 points behind Palou, Ericsson needs to score at least 27 points more than Palou to remain above water. If Ericsson were to win this weekend with the minimum 51 points for a victory, he would need Palou to finish eighth or worse to remain alive. The worst Ericsson can finish and remain alive is fourth with at least one bonus point and that result would also require Palou finishing 25th or worse with zero points going to the Spaniard. 

Ganassi and Penske

It is another year where IndyCar has celebrated its parity with eight different winners from six different teams, but since the start of summer it has been two teams that have dominated the series, and it just happened to be the two most successful teams over the last 20 years. 

Chip Ganassi Racing and Team Penske have combined to win the last six races, starting with Álex Palou's Road America victory with Josef Newgarden's first victory of the season following at Mid-Ohio on Independence Day. Marcus Ericsson won IndyCar's return from summer break on the streets of Nashville before Will Power followed with his first victory of the season on the IMS road course. Newgarden won the final oval race at Gateway and Palou won at Portland to start the final three-week stretch to close the season. 

After Ganassi and Penske combined to win 12 of 14 races last year, the teams have won a combined nine of 14 races in 2021 with two races remaining. Four of the final five championship-eligible drivers represent the two teams and they have six of the top ten drivers in the championship. 

These two teams have been snagging the checkered flags, but a few other teams and drivers have been knocking on the door of victory. 

Road America was set to be either Ganassi or Penske winning. Newgarden dominated that race before the gearbox let him down on the final restart with two laps, allowing Palou to slide on through for his second victory of the season. At Mid-Ohio, Newgarden was able to finally close out a victory after leading 73 of 80 laps, but Newgarden had to hold off a charging Ericsson in the final laps, while Palou and Dixon made it three Ganassi cars in the top four. 

Nashville should have been Colton Herta's race. Herta led 39 of 80 laps, only to be shuffled backward due to the string of cautions that saw over 41% of the race take place behind the safety car. Meanwhile, Ericsson had the most fortunate set of events lead him from climbing over Sébastien Bourdais on the lap five restart to pit stops shuffling him to the lead and pulling out the victory. 

Power deserved victory on the IMS road course, but it was another IMS road course race where Romain Grosjean was running second and looking to be a threat for victory while Herta was third. At Gateway, Herta led 101 laps before his driveshaft broke while leading with fewer than 80 laps remaining. With Herta out of the race, it cleared the way for Newgarden to take his second victory. 

And then there was Portland. Last week's race saw another chaotic start and moved all top four qualifies along with a few other cars to the back of the field for blowing the chicane. Patricio O'Ward led the first 28 laps before making his first pit stop, allowing Graham Rahal to assume the lead. Rahal led the most laps as he attempted to make it on two pit stops. While Rahal looked set for victory, his fuel saving along with being leapfrogged by about a half-dozen cars after his final stop dropped him to tenth. 

In the last six races, Ganassi and Penske drivers have combined to lead 394 of 670 laps. Newgarden has led 245 of those 394 laps. 

What Can We Learn From 2019?

Contemporary IndyCar has only one Laguna Seca race under its belt when it made its long-awaited return two years ago. 

It was a three-stop race for everyone with all first stops occurring between lap 9-19 with Marcus Ericsson stopping first and Will Power stopping last. Second pit stops fell between lap 30, which saw Marco Andretti stop after a 17-lap stint, and lap 40, again seeing Power going 21 laps, and Sébastien Bourdais who went 25 laps on his second stint. Final stops fell between laps 60 and 67. Andretti stopped on lap 60 and made it the final 30 laps while Power's third stint was 27 laps before a 23-lap sprint to the end. 

Colton Herta strategy had pit stops on lap 18, lap 39 and lap 64. Power had started seventh and his strategy moved him up to fifth after his first stop, fourth after his second stop and he made it to second after his third stop. 

Only two drivers starting outside the top ten ended up finishing in the top ten, Felix Rosenqvist went from 14th to fifth, but Rosenqvist's starting position is a bit of misnomer. He was fourth in group two during the first round of qualifying, but he caused a local yellow and lost his fastest lap. However, his second fastest lap was good enough for fourth in the group, but the rulebook states any driver that caused a local yellow could not advance to the second round. 

Rosenqvist was up to tenth before the first pit cycle picked up. After the first round of stops, he was eighth and was soon up to seventh. After his second stop, the Swede was up to fifth and he battled Simon Pagenaud for fourth over the final stint of the race. 

Bourdais was racing with sore neck and went from 19th to seventh, but he went backward at the start, dropping to 20th at the end of the first lap. It got worse, as Bourdais was down to 22nd at the end of lap three. He did 15 laps on his first stint and after the first cycle he was 17th. He climbed up to 15th and was up to 14th after Conor Daly spun in turn two, bringing out the lone caution in the race. Bourdais jumped up to 11th on that restart.

After his final stop, Bourdais emerged in eighth and went 25 laps on his final stint. He picked up seventh from Newgarden with five laps to go. 

Most times, when a driver finishes tenth after starting ninth, it is a non-story, but Ryan Hunter-Reay's 2019 Laguna Seca race deserves some attention. Hunter-Reay went forward ahead of his first stop on lap 15, but stalled on that stop and dropped to 24th, dead last. He was a lap down after his second stop on lap 37 before Herta made his second stop of the race. 

At the lap 48 restart, Hunter-Reay was 21st. He was 18th at the end of lap 49. After lap 54, he was up to 16th. Four laps later, he was 15th... then 14th the lap after that... and 13th the lap after that before making his final stop on lap 63. After the pit cycle, he was 12th. He was up to 11th on lap 68 and got back to tenth on lap 70, where he remained for the final 20 laps of the race. 

There were 160 total passes in the 2019 race, 145 of those for position. While Herta led 83 of 90 laps, the average interval between first and second on non-caution laps and not during the pit cycles was 1.2422 seconds with 45 laps where the margin was under a second and the lead was under two seconds after 70 laps. 

Team Dynamics

With only two rounds remaining in the 2021 season, it is a good time to see how the intra-team battles have played out this season. 

Ganassi has three of its drivers still alive for the championship and, no matter what happens over the next two races, Dixon cannot win the team's head-to-head-to-head-to-head battle. Dixon has only been the top Ganassi finisher in three races and it was three of the first four races, St. Petersburg and the Texas doubleheader. Palou has been the top finisher in six races and Ericsson has been on top in five races, including a four-race stretch from Mid-Ohio through Gateway. In six races this season, all three drivers have finished in the top ten.

In qualifying, Palou holds the edge with six times coming out on top to Dixon's four and Ericsson's two. 

Newgarden has been the overwhelming top driver at Penske, being the top finisher in nine races. The only other Penske driver to finish best in the team multiple times is Will Power, who has been best in team three times. The only time Simon Pagenaud was the top finisher was third in the Indianapolis 500 and Scott McLaughlin was best in the team with his runner-up finish at Texas. Only once this season has Penske had multiple top five finishers. That was at Gateway, where Newgarden won, and Power was third. 

When it comes to qualifying, Newgarden has been on top in six races, Power four times with Pagenaud and McLaughlin each having one tally to their names.

Andretti Autosport has seen each of its four drivers come out on top over the last four races, however, overall, Herta and Rossi are tied at six races apiece as best finisher in the team while Hunter-Reay and Hinchcliffe have each only been on top once. In qualifying, Herta leads nine to three over Rossi with the other two drivers having not been the top qualifier once this season. Andretti Autosport has had multiple top ten finishers in three of the last four races after having only multiple top ten finishers in only one of the first ten races.

At Arrow McLaren SP, it has been all Patricio O'Ward. O'Ward is up 11-3 on Felix Rosenqvist in race finishes and 8-4 on qualifying. The only times Rosenqvist has beat O'Ward is when O'Ward has finished outside the top ten.

Graham Rahal leads the way in the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing camp. Rahal has been the top finisher nine times to Takuma Sato's four while Santino Ferrucci was the team's top finisher in the Indianapolis 500. The only time Sato has beat Rahal when Rahal has finished in the top ten was the first Belle Isle race, where RLLR went 4-5-6 with Sato ahead of Rahal and Ferrucci. In qualifying, it is Rahal again up 9-2 to Sato and Christian Lundgaard was top qualifier for the August IMS road course race. 

Ed Carpenter Racing has seen a strange swing of results. After not losing head-to-head to Conor Daly in his first 13 starts with ECR, Rinus VeeKay has not finished ahead of Conor Daly in their last five races together as teammates. VeeKay holds a 6-5 lead over Daly while Carpenter was top finisher twice and Oliver Askew beat Daly in Askew's one start substituting for VeeKay at Road America after the Dutchman broke his collarbone. Daly does hold a significant edge in qualifying, 7-4 over VeeKay with Carpenter top qualifier at Gateway. ECR has not had a top ten finishers in any of the last seven races after having at least one top ten finishers in six of the first seven races. 

Dale Coyne Racing is closer than it appears. Romain Grosjean is only up 7-5 on Ed Jones. One of Jones' victories was against Pietro Fittipaldi, but Fittipaldi went 2-1 in his three oval starts. Each time Jones has beat Grosjean, Grosjean has finished outside the top fifteen and in three of those races Grosjean has finished outside the top twenty. In qualifying, Grosjean is up 8-4, but Jones has been top qualifier in the last two races. 

A.J. Foyt Racing is all Sébastien Bourdais. Bourdais has been the top finisher in 11 races. The two times Dalton Kellett was on top were the first Texas race when Newgarden ran over Bourdais and Nashville when Ericsson ran over Bourdais. J.R. Hildebrand was the team's top finisher in the Indianapolis 500. In qualifying, it is 11-1 in favor of Bourdais with Hildebrand also being the team's top qualifier at the Indianapolis 500. 

Meyer Shank Racing has not had two full-time cars, but Jack Harvey and Hélio Castroneves have been teammate for four races this year. It is a small sample size, but it is 2-2. Castroneves won the Indianapolis 500 and was ninth at Nashville while Harvey finished 15th. Harvey was sixth to Castroneves' 21st in the August IMS road course race and fourth to Castroneves' 23rd at Portland. It is also 2-2 in qualifying results with Castroneves on top for the Indianapolis 500 and Portland while Harvey started better at Nashville and on the IMS road course. 

Road to Indy

Once again, Indy Lights is the only series joining IndyCar this weekend and it is the penultimate round of the season for the Indy Lights series. 

With 128 points left on the table, only three drivers are alive for the championship. 

David Malukas has a five-point lead over Kyle Kirkwood. The two drivers split the Portland doubleheader last weekend and they have finished first and second over the last four races, with Malukas coming out on top in three of those races. Linus Lundqvist has an outside shot at the championship, but Lundqvist trails by 73 points. Lundqvist was third in both Portland races, his first podium finishes since the second Belle Isle race in June. 

Malukas has only two starts at Laguna Seca and he was fifth and seventh in the 2019 Indy Lights races. Kirkwood won the first Indy Pro 2000 race at Laguna Seca before an opening lap accident took him out of race two. 

Benjamin Pedersen was fourth in the top Portland races and Pedersen is fourth in the championship on 283 points, 11 points ahead of Danial Frost. Frost, despite finishing eighth and sixth in Portland, moved ahead of Andretti Autosport teammate Devlin DeFrancesco in the championship by three points. DeFrancesco was 11th and seventh in those two races. Robert Megennis picked up fifth-place finishes in both Portland races. Megennis is ten points behind DeFrancesco. 

Indy Lights will race at 3:45 p.m. ET on Saturday September 18 and at 1:15 p.m. ET on Sunday September 19. 

It should be noted that the Indy Lights season finale will occur on a standalone weekend with the other two Road to Indy Series, Indy Pro 2000 and U.S. F2000, at Mid-Ohio on the weekend of October 1-3. 

Fast Facts

This will be the 13th IndyCar race on September 19 and first since Hélio Castroneves won at Motegi in 2010. That was the final Motegi oval race. 

Héctor Rebaque famously got his one and only IndyCar victory in his final start on September 19, 1982 at Road America. 

Nigel Mansell's final IndyCar victory came on September 19, 1993 at Nazareth. Mansell clinched the 1993 CART championship with that victory. 

Laguna Seca was supposed to host a race last year on September 19 after the weekend was expanded into a doubleheader on one of the many revisions to the 2020 schedule before it would be ultimately dropped from the calendar. 

Cristiano da Matta celebrates his 48th birthday on race day. Da Matta was the 2002 Laguna Seca winner. That victory was his was his first of four consecutive victories that season. Da Matta ended up as the 2002 CART champion.

Da Matta is one of two drivers to win at Laguna Seca in Indy Lights and IndyCar. The other is Bryan Herta. Scott Dixon or Rinus VeeKay could become the third driver to do it this weekend.

Jimmy Vasser, Jacques Villeneuve, and Patrick Carpentier are the three drivers to win at Laguna Seca in Atlantics and IndyCar. Ryan Hunter-Reay or James Hinchcliffe could become the fourth driver to do it this weekend. 

Five times has a driver won at Laguna Seca and the championship in the same season (Bobby Rahal 1986-87, Danny Sullivan 1988, Michael Andretti 1991, da Matta 2002). 

This will be the sixth time Laguna Seca has hosted the penultimate race of the season (1983, 1984, 1987, 1988, 1997).

Five times has a driver won consecutive Laguna Seca races (Bobby Rahal 1984-87, Michael Andretti 1991-92, Paul Tracy 1993-94, Bryan Herta 1998-99, Patrick Carpentier 2003-04). 

The average starting position for a Laguna Seca winner is 2.608 with a median of one. 

The pole-sitter has won 15 of 23 Laguna Seca races and 19 races have been won from the front row. 

Only two Laguna Seca races have been won from outside the top five: Jimmy Vasser from sixth in 1997 and Max Papis from 25th in 2001.

The average number of lead changes in a Laguna Seca race is 3.0434 with a median of three. 

The 2019 Laguna Seca race had seven lead changes, tied for the second most all-time. The most was eight in 1988, the first race on the 2.214-mile configuration. 

Six Laguna Seca races have featured zero lead changes, but every other Laguna Seca race has had at least two lead changes. 

The average number of cautions in a Laguna Seca race is 1.782 with a median of one. The average number of caution laps is 7.4782 with a median of eight.

There have been six caution-free races at Laguna Seca, but the most recent caution-free race was 1997. 

Possible Milestones:

Scott Dixon is one victory away from tying Mario Andretti for second all-time with 52 victories.

If Scott Dixon takes the green flag, he will become the fifth driver in IndyCar history to make 350 starts. 

If Will Power takes the green flag, he will become the 15th driver in IndyCar history to make 250 starts.

If Ryan Hunter-Reay takes the green flag, he will make his 281st start, tying him with Paul Tracy for tenth all-time. 

Alexander Rossi is one podium finish away from his 25th podium finish. 

Will Power needs to lead 80 laps to surpass Dario Franchitti for eighth all-time in laps led.

Josef Newgarden needs to lead 21 laps to surpass Tony Bettenhausen for 19th all-time in laps led. Newgarden could also surpass Dan Wheldon with 30 laps led.

Sébastien Bourdais needs to lead 20 laps to reach the 2,700 laps led milestone.

Ryan Hunter-Reay needs to lead 47 laps to reach the 1,600 laps led milestone.

James Hinchcliffe needs to lead 19 laps to reach the 800 laps led milestone.

Colton Herta needs to lead 89 laps to reach the 600 laps led milestone.

Graham Rahal needs to lead 10 laps to reach the 500 laps led milestone.

Predictions

Laguna Seca is the place where Alexander Rossi breaks through and gets his first victory since June 2019. Josef Newgarden will finish second. Scott Dixon is the top finishing Ganassi driver for the first time since May. There will be four drivers alive for the championship heading to Long Beach. Álex Palou's championship lead will shrink but it will still be double digits. Felix Rosenqvist will be the best finishing AMSP driver. Callum Ilott will complete more than half the race. Oliver Askew will not spin. Rinus VeeKay finally finishes in the top fifteen. Romain Grosjean does not hit anyone at the start. At least three drivers starting outside the top ten finish in the top ten. Sleeper: Sébastien Bourdais.