Five drivers will be alive for the IndyCar championship entering Laguna Seca. IndyCar figured out how to have a clean start at Portland. Colton Herta might have a contract with Red Bull. That is only destined to go poorly. Meanwhile, there was a lot of orange and Mercedes botched its best chance at a victory this season. Ferrari continues to be a mess. NASCAR did call a caution for rain this weekend. Darlington broke many hearts. Ducati riders were falling like flies in Misano, but that didn't stop MotoGP from having a photo finish. It was nearly a podium sweep for Italians on home soil, but the Spaniards did sweep a podium. Some junior series awarded championships this weekend. Here is a rundown of what got me thinking.
Myles Matters
It wasn't the fairy tale ending to the U.S. F2000 season for Myles Rowe, who entered the Portland weekend as the championship leader with three races remaining. An off-track moment in the first race of the weekend while running second cost him a significant number of points and put in greater danger from teammate Jace Denmark and his other championship rival Michael d'Orlando. In the second race, Rowe and Denmark collided in the firs corner with both coughing up massive amounts of points. In the final race, Rowe had a tire punctured after contact early, but recovered to drive from 15th to fifth. However, d'Orlando's victory in the final race was enough to earn him the championship.
Though Rowe didn't win the championship, his 2022 season was an historic achievement as he became the first black driver to win a Road to Indy race and this could be the first milestone toward Rowe becoming the Road to Indy's most influential driver.
There is great difficulty for anyone to get into racing. The cost is out of reach for most average people. It requires a lot of sacrifice to get a child into racing and on the path to a driving career. Just making it to a top series can cost millions of dollars alone. Once at the top, a driver could be scrapping to find the millions necessary to remain in competition.
If a driver is good enough, a sponsor will see the value and talent and fund that career early on. Once at the top, the best talents will draw sponsors who want to be associated with the best and it can turn a costly dream into a lucrative livelihood. Many experience the former. Only a fraction gets a taste of the latter.
Rowe's career nearly didn't happen. He competed in karting as a teenager but a brief taste of car racing in the Lucas Oil School Formula Race Car Series where he won the winter series championship and caught Will Power's eye. However, at 18 years old, Rowe's career stalled out. There was no move to the Road to Indy, no move to a European junior series or a sports car series. Rowe went to college, Pace University.
While getting an education, Rowe still ran some karting and stayed in touch with Power. During the pandemic, in response to the racial injustices that had afflicted minorities, many organizations increased diversity efforts and IndyCar did the same, creating the "Race for Equality & Change" initiative and creating the Force Indy team for the Road to Indy.
Force Indy started in U.S. F2000 last year and Rowe was drafted to be its driver. Rowe had not been in a race car in three years, a difficult circumstance to face. Testing pace was encouraging. Race results were harder to come by, but Rowe found his way into the top ten. He also had many incidents that left him with damaged race cars. It became a theme and his position in the standings was not something to boast about. But at New Jersey Motorsports Park, in damp conditions Rowe won. He was fifth in the penultimate race of the season at Mid-Ohio. The talent was being harnessed and the raw pace was becoming results.
However, motorsports is not a place for ideal plans. Force Indy moved up to Indy Lights to support Trans-Am champion and Superstar Racing Experience race winner Ernie Francis, Jr. Rowe was left on the sidelines again. He found an open seat at Pabst Racing but didn't have the funding for the full season. He had enough for the first three race weekends. He won at St. Petersburg and then at Barber. He was fourth in the championship through the race weekend at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
Despite no longer being a Force Indy driver, Roger Penske has continued to support Rowe and we got to see a full season of what the Georgia-born driver is capable of. Given the opportunity, we saw a promising driver who could have a career in IndyCar someday.
It will not be easy moving forward. Success doesn't guarantee funds. While the Road to Indy scholarships cover champions, deserving drivers who finish second, third or fourth in a championship get no support. Any upward movement is mostly dependent on the driver. Rowe was able to get together part of a program for this season and his success turned it into a full campaign. The offseason will raise the question over whether or not he can raise more, whether that is to continue in U.S. F2000 or move to Indy Pro 2000.
The Road to Indy was formally established ahead of the 2010 season. Rowe is the first black driver to complete a full season. He is on a path to a series that has had only two competitors compete in its biggest race. Through 106 Indianapolis 500s, Willy T. Ribbs and George Mack are the only black drivers to compete in arguably the most famous race in the world. That is two out of 791 drivers, barely 0.25%.
Diversity may exist in nationalities and languages spoken on the grid, but it has never existed in terms of skin color. Rowe is the closest IndyCar has had to a driver of color in 20 years. He could become the first black driver to make a career in IndyCar, but it will still have taken until the 2020s for IndyCar to see a regular black competitor.
Every motorsports series lacks racial diversity. The NHRA might be the one exception. Lewis Hamilton is a seven-time World Drivers' Champion, but we haven't another driver of color on the Formula One grid in the 15 years since Hamilton's debut. Bubba Wallace is full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, but when Wallace made his debut in 2017, he was the first black driver to start a Cup race since Bill Lester nearly 11 years earlier. Before Lester's Cup debut in 2006, NASCAR's top series had not had a black driver since Ribbs in 1986.
There are many factors as to why black drivers are not more common in the 2020s, and each step to make a series more inclusive and accessible is greatly welcomed.
Rowe got an opportunity with the Force Indy program, and it opened a door to this second season in U.S. F2000, a year where he went wire-to-wire in the championship discussion and was one of the best drivers in the series. Hopefully, this season leads to more not just for Rowe but other drivers like him down the road.
While Rowe competed for the U.S. F2000 championship this weekend, on the other side of the United States, Serena Williams competed in the US Open, which could be her final grand slam tournament. Williams, along with her sister Venus, shattered the stereotype of what a tennis player could be. Black players were uncommon in tennis for most of the 20th century, but the Williams sisters revolutionize the sport. They showed a generation of black girls they could play in tennis and in the two-plus decades since they debuted, many black American women have followed in their footsteps and become top-ranked professional tennis players.
Motorsports has not had that Williams figure yet. Hamilton is without a doubt a person of inspiration and there is a group of young hopefuls who hope to follow his footsteps, but the progress must come in who competes and who gets opportunities.
In the United States, Rowe has gotten an opportunity at the entry level. It might not lead to IndyCar, but should the results remain at the level seen in 2022 throughout each step in the Road to Indy system, Rowe should get that IndyCar opportunity.
As with Hamilton, any IndyCar appearance for Rowe would not mean the job is done. There are plenty of things within IndyCar and within society at large that must be done to increase the opportunities for minority drivers hoping to break into motorsports. The work is only getting started.
Champions From the Weekend
You know about Michael d'Orlando, but did you know....
Louis Foster clinched the Indy Pro 2000 championship with his victory in the first Portland race on Friday morning.
Dominique Aegerter clinched the MotoE championship with finishes of second and fourth at Misano.
Winners From the Weekend
You know about Scott McLaughlin and more, but did you know...
Max Verstappen won the Dutch Grand Prix, his tenth victory of the season and fourth consecutive.
Francesco Bagnaia won MotoGP's San Marino and Rimini Riviera motorcycle Grand Prix by 0.034 seconds over Enea Bastianini. Alonso López won the Moto2 race, his first career grand prix victory. Dennis Foggia won the Moto3 race, his third victory of the season. Mattia Casadei and Matteo Ferrari split the MotoE races.
Erik Jones won the Southern 500, his first victory since the 2019 Southern 500. Noah Gragson won the NASCAR Grand National Series race, his fourth victory of the season.
Benjamin Pedersen won the Indy Lights race from Portland, his first career victory in the series. Reece Gold won the final two races of the Indy Pro 2000 season. Jace Denmark and Mac Clark split the first two U.S. F2000 races.
Marcus Armstrong and Felipe Drugovich split the Formula Two races from Zandvoort. Caio Collet and Zane Maloney split the Formula Three races.
The #25 Sainteloc Audi of Christopher Mies, Patric Niederhauser and Lucas Legeret won the 3 Hours of Hockenheim.
Coming Up This Weekend
IndyCar season finale from Laguna Seca.
Italian Grand Prix.
NASCAR has an earlier visit to Kansas.
The 6 Hours of Fuji returns to the FIA World Endurance Championship calendar.
Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters are back at Spa-Francorchamps.
Supercars has one final trip to Pukekohe Park Raceway.
World Superbike is back after six weeks off with a round at Magny-Cours.
The World Rally Championship will contest the Acropolis Rally.
