Here is a rundown of what got me thinking...
There was a first-time winner in Japan, and a championship has tightened up. There was a usual winner in Germany, and a championship flipped. Grass and gravel run-off must be brought back to Watkins Glen. It was a great weekend for Antipodean drivers around the world. That does seem to be a normal thing though. Some hardware was handed out in Portland. Álex Palou clinched his fourth IndyCar championship with a third-place finish. Will Power got Team Penske's first victory of the IndyCar season, and Will Power was on my mind this weekend long before he was victorious.
Some Random Thoughts
Coincidentally, these thoughts are all driver-related as 2025 is nearing its ends and soon all that will be left to talk about is what will 2026 look like. There has been a lot of noise but no action when it comes to next season, but with all the talk something must be true.
Are We Really Watching the End of Will Power?
I still cannot get over that we are in the middle of August and we are not sure if Will Power will have a ride for the 2026 season.
Contract negotiations have been at the forefront of the 2025 season for Power, and they have only become more in focus as the championship was essentially clinched in May and we were left with three months of deadrubber events.
What we know is Power does not have a contract for the 2026 season, and Team Penske's unofficial development driver David Malukas is the intended replacement.
This has not been a great season for Team Penske across the board. From the off-track issues with illegally modified pieces leading to the dismissals of Tim Cindric, Ron Ruzewski and Kyle Moyer, to the on-track struggles the team has not seen since 1999. Team Penske has been a mess in every department, and it isn't one driver that has been the disappointment. If anything, Power has been the one bright spot.
Power has been the top Penske driver in the championship for most of this season. Yesterday, he got Penske its first victory of the season in race 15 of 17. He has been the better finisher for most of this season. His qualifying form has gotten back on track and he won his first pole position in nearly two years. This is also a driver who is only three years removed from his most recent championship, which is also Team Penske's most recent championship.
Results suggest that replacing Power will not be the winning move, but away from the results, Power will be 45 years old at the start of next season. We are closer to the end of his career than the start, and Penske's recent history has been to make a move a few years early rather than a few years too late.
Juan Pablo Montoya was phased out of the organization after the 2016 season where he was eighth in the championship after finishing fourth in 2014 and lost the championship on tiebreaker in 2015. Montoya was 41 years old at the time.
Hélio Castroneves was transitioned to sports car racing after the 2017 season as the IndyCar program contracted to three cars and the Acura DPi program expanded. Castroneves was 42 years old, but he had finished in the top five of the championship in six consecutive seasons and in nine of the previous ten years.
If anything, Power has been racing on borrowed time by Team Penske standards.
It must be acknowledged that Power hasn't been the same clinical Will Power. Though his victory yesterday means Power avoids his second winless season in three years, he has only won multiple races once in the last five seasons. While he won the title in 2022, that is sandwiched between a ninth in 2021 and a seventh in 2023 when he didn't win a race. Yesterday’s victory vaulted Power up to sixth in the championship from ninth. He also went nearly two full calendar years without a pole position, and he hasn't won a pole position on a road or street course since the 2022 season finale. It is reasonable to realize there has been a dip in form.
What doesn't sit right is Power has been swinging in the wind for months now and is about to be shuffled out for a driver who does not appear to be better on paper.
When Montoya lost his full-time ride, it was lost to Josef Newgarden, who was competing for championships with Ed Carpenter Racing and was a multiple race winner, and he also ended up fourth in the championship despite racing half the 2016 season with screws in his shoulder holding a broken collarbone together. Castroneves lost his full-time seat when Penske scaled down to three full-time cars, a number the team was more comfortable with running than four.
For all the flashes from Malukas, it is hazier on whether or not he will be an upgrade over Power and lift Team Penske. All the issues with Team Penske stem from the uncertainty behind the scenes. This isn’t a Team Penske with Tim Cindric leading the way where all three cars are the most prepared for success. It is doubtful Team Penske will right everything in the offseason and we can feel confident Team Penske will roll into the track and be one of the team’s to beat.
Malukas is on pace for his best season in IndyCar. It is also a season where he has only four top ten finishes from 15 races. Marcus Armstrong, Rinus VeeKay and Christian Rasmussen all have more. While Malukas has shown good qualifying pace, the trend has seen him falling back and not running competitively.
At some point, it will be time for Power to move on, but at Team Penske, Power does not get to make up the terms of his end. The team decides as it did for Montoya and Castroneves prior, but I don't think anyone thought Power would be shuffled out when it still feels like he is the best option out there for the organization.
The Lack of a Silly Season
As I was thinking about this on Friday, Racer Magazine's Marshall Pruett wrote an article on silly season, and it was exactly what I was thinking.
The only thing we have heard around silly season this year is the Power/Malukas dilemma at Team Penske.
Have you heard rumors of any other drivers moving or any teams making a change?
Pretty much everyone else is locked in with status quo from 2025 to 2026. The only other rumblings appear to be what happens with the three real paid seats in IndyCar (Sting Ray Robb, Devlin DeFrancesco and Jacob Abel), and does Meyer Shank Racing have the money to keep Marcus Armstrong? And I guess if Conor Daly has the funding to remain at Juncos Hollinger Racing. If Power stays at Team Penske, we are going to be looking at a rather silent offseason.
Who is even out there?
Dennis Hauger was dominating the Indy Lights championship, but that has become more of a fight in recent weeks. Hauger's victory at Portland certainly appears to have swung the momentum back in his favor with two races remaining. Hauger was the only Indy Lights driver anyone was considering as a full-time IndyCar option in 2026 for much of this year, and even with Caio Collet's recent success, no one has mentioned Collet as a potential IndyCar driver next year.
Besides Hauger, the only driver on the outside getting any attention was Théo Pourchaire, and even that has been rather subdue attention, mostly limited to an acknowledgement earlier this year that Simon Pagenaud was helping Pourchaire look for a seat in IndyCar.
That's it. That is the list of drivers on the outside looking to be in come 2026.
There also doesn't seem to be a big wave of drivers looking to get into IndyCar at the moment. Besides Toby Sowery and Linus Lundqvist, who has competed recently that seems to want to be in IndyCar? Hunter McElrea? Has anyone been stumping for Hunter McElrea to have a full-time seat?
I guess Sowery along with Jüri Vips are in a game of musical chairs at Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing as both are reserve drivers for RLLR and that is one of the few teams where a seat could be open. But there is no buzz of young talent darting around the paddock looking for opportunities for next year. It has been all quiet on the European front in potential interest.
Maybe we get a few surprises, but it feels like outside of what could happen at Team Penske what changes do come will hardly register on the Richter Scale.
Where are the next generation of Indianapolis 500 one-offs coming from?
This is something I noticed when looking at the championship standings.
Of the Indianapolis 500 one-offs from this year, who do you think is the youngest?
The answer is Jack Harvey, and he is 32 years old. Then you had Kyle Larson, who will most likely never race the Indianapolis 500 ever again, at 33 years old, and then four of the other five drivers are over 40. Marco Andretti is still only 38 years old, by the way.
But you had 44-year-old Ed Carpenter, 44-year-old Ryan Hunter-Reay, 48-year-old Takuma Sato, and 50-year-old Hélio Castroneves competing at Indianapolis this year. They all probably have at least one more Indianapolis 500 in them, but there is a chance they all don't have two.
Indianapolis 500 one-offs go through a natural cycle. A few age out and then there is always someone there to fill the role, whether that be another driver transitioning from full-time career to one-off in May to a young driver who has the funding for May though not a full season, but when you consider this year's group of one-offs, a great majority of them transitioned from full-time driving a while ago.
Andretti has not been full-time since 2020. Castroneves did return to full-time driving in 2022 and 2023, but he had been a part-timer for the four seasons prior to that. Carpenter hasn't been full-time since 2013, but he stopped running all the oval races at the end of last year when he had Christian Rasmussen run the final three oval events in 2024. This was Carpenter's first season running Indianapolis only. Sato was last full-time in 2022. Hunter-Reay was last full-time in 2021, though he ran the second-half of 2023 for Ed Carpenter Racing.
Harvey is in a limbo phase of his career. He was practically full-time last year. He has been on television this season except for Indianapolis. He is still only 32 years old. He could be an Indianapolis-only driver for the next four or five years, but of this year's group, he is the only one you can feel confident will be around in four or five years' time.
In recent years, things have shifted away from the drivers who have some IndyCar experience but are always around for Indianapolis. It could be we are just in a part of the cycle where we don't see those drivers getting rides, but in a few years they could be back and we will go through the better part of a decade with them around.
But think of the drivers we don't see who were once fixtures.
Sage Karam made nine consecutive starts at Indianapolis while trying to get back in the series full-time and it has been over three years since he last competed. Karam is only 30 years old.
It has also been three years since J.R. Hildebrand's last Indianapolis 500 attempt. Hildebrand had made 12 consecutive starts at Indianapolis while also getting a few extra races here and there and was last full-time in 2017. Hildebrand is also 37 years old, and it seems like he is fine not being in the driver seat and working on a timing stand to help a top team.
Pippa Mann attempted Indianapolis for nine consecutive years with a smattering of other IndyCar starts over that near-decade career. She hasn't been entered for Indianapolis since 2019.
Charlie Kimball could have fit this mold, but he failed to make the 2021 race in an extra car for A.J. Foyt Racing. It was really Kimball's only attempt as a true one-off entry. He is now 40 years old.
Along with Kimball, there have also been lost drivers such as Spencer Pigot, Gabby Chaves, Carlos Muñoz, RC Enerson and Oliver Askew, who never became those regular Indianapolis one-offs either. You can even throw Ed Jones into that boat if you want.
Stefan Wilson is the closest to someone being that regular. Over eight years, Wilson made five attempts at Indianapolis. He would have also made five starts if he had not suffered broken vertebrae in that Monday practice accident six days before the race in 2023, his last appearance at the Speedway.
James Hinchcliffe could have been this driver, but he turned to broadcasting after 2021 and fully stepped away from driving. Simon Pagenaud could have also been this driver, but the effects from his accident at Mid-Ohio in 2023 linger and keep him from returning to competition.
There will be somebody around who will get these seats. Someone will find the funding and take the chance to race in the Indianapolis 500. We are not going to have the day where we are struggling to find 33 drivers willing and able to race the Indianapolis 500.
Jay Howard went six years between Indianapolis appearances from 2011 to 2017. Buddy Lazier was on the sidelines for three years and then returned with his own team. There is still a world where the likes of Pigot or Chaves or Askew make a return, but we are at a crossroads and we will soon see familiar faces who have been some of the best to race at 16th & Georgetown no longer there and who steps in with the plans to only race on that one weekend in May is currently unclear.
Champion From the Weekend
You know about Álex Palou, but did you know...
Jack Jeffers clinched the U.S. F2000 championship with finishes of second, first and second from Portland
Winners From the Weekend
You know about the Will Power, Dennis Hauger and Jack Jeffers, but did you know...
Max Garcia swept the USF Pro 2000 races from Portland. Thomas Schrage (race one) and Teddy Musella (race three) won the other two U.S. F2000 races.
Shane van Gisbergen won the NASCAR Cup race from Watkins Glen, his fourth victory of the season. Connor Zilisch won the Grand National Series race, his sixth victory of the seaosn. Corey Heim won the Truck race, his sixth victory of the season.
Jack Aitken and René Rast split the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters races from the Nürburgring.
Broc Feeney (race one and three) and Will Brown (race two) split the Supercars races from Queensland Raceway.
Ayumu Iwasa won the Super Formula race from Sportsland SUGO, his first career victory.
Ryan Timms won the 64th Knoxville Nationals.
Coming Up This Weekend
MotoGP returns from its summer break with the Austrian Grand Prix.
NASCAR will race in Richmond.
GT World Challenge America is at Road America.
