The second round of the 2026 NTT IndyCar Series Season takes the series to Phoenix Raceway for a weekend that will be shared with NASCAR, which will have its top two divisions in competition as well. For IndyCar, it will be the 65th race held at the one-mile oval, a little shy of 62 years after the first time American open-wheel racing's top series visited. In 1964, the inaugural visit was the season opener, and A.J. Foyt took the first of what would be a record seven consecutive victories. Foyt went onto win a record ten races that season. In 2026, Phoenix is the second round and Álex Palou has already won a race. Palou has led the IndyCar championship since June 23, 2024 after a victory at Laguna Seca, 28 consecutive races entering this weekend.
Coverage
Time: Coverage begins at 3:00 p.m. ET on Saturday March 7 with green flag scheduled for 3:20 p.m. ET.
Channel: Fox
Announcers: Will Buxton, Townsend Bell and James Hinchcliffe will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Georgia Henneberry and Jack Harvey will work pit lane.
Channel: Fox
Announcers: Will Buxton, Townsend Bell and James Hinchcliffe will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Georgia Henneberry and Jack Harvey will work pit lane.
IndyCar Weekend Schedule
Friday:
First Practice: 10:00 a.m. ET (60 minutes)
Qualifying: 2:00 p.m. ET
High-Line Practice: 3:40 p.m. ET (80 minutes)
Final Practice: 5:10 p.m. ET (50 minutes)
Saturday:
Race: 3:29 p.m. ET (250 laps)
Early Oval Opportunity
Oval races have been few and far between in IndyCar over recent seasons, but they have been more common early in the season than we realize. While the last two seasons did not have an oval until the Indianapolis 500, this is the third time in the last six years an oval has occurred in one of the first two races, and it is the fourth time in that timespan an oval has occurred before the Indianapolis 500.
It is a chance for some drivers to get a jump on the championship.
The bad news is Álex Palou is a top oval driver. Last year, Palou scored the most oval points in 2025 with two victories and two runner-up finishes. His worst finish on an oval in 2025 was eighth at Gateway. The Catalan driver has nine top five finishes in the 13 oval races dating back to the 2024 season and 14 top ten finishes in the last 18 oval races dating back to 2023.
Though Palou will be the man to beat, an oval race could be a great chance for someone to get ahead of him.
Patricio O'Ward has scored the most oval points in two of the last five seasons, and he has finished in the top four of oval points in the last five seasons. Last year, O'Ward was second in oval points, and it got him second in the championship. Palou scored 252 oval points while O'Ward tallied 208 points on the circle tracks. O'Ward won at Iowa and he had five top five finishes on ovals last year. He won pole position for the Nashville finale before he got into the way and was classified in 24th.
Josef Newgarden won that Nashville race to give him his one and only victory in the 2025 season. It was the tenth consecutive season in which Newgarden won an oval race, the longest streak in IndyCar history. He started 2025 with two finishes outside the top twenty. He was caught in an accident at Gateway while leading when Louis Foster spun. Newgarden recovered with a second at Iowa and he was in the top ten for the final four oval races.
Newgarden only had the fourth-most oval points in 2025 with 156. The driver with the third-most was Christian Rasmussen on 173 points. Rasmussen stood out at the end of 2025 when he scored his first career victory at Milwaukee with an impressive drive to the front. The Dane had five consecutive top ten finishes on ovals, including a third at Gateway, before he spun on the opening lap at Nashville and was the first driver out of the season finale.
This will be a key weekend for Team Penske. While Penske only won one oval race in 2025, it has been the dominant force on the discipline for an extended period. Penske has won 17 of 33 oval races since the introduction of the aeroscreen in 2020. Newgarden has been responsible for 13 of those victories, but Scott McLaughlin won two of those races, and he was the top driver in oval points in 2024. However, last season was a downward turn for the New Zealander. McLaughlin was 12th in oval points as he failed to start the Indianapolis 500, had a mechanical issue leave him 24th at Gateway, and he was caught in an opening lap accident in the second Iowa race. McLaughlin did finish in the top five of the other three oval races, including finishing third in both the final two races of the season.
Phoenix will be a opportunity for David Malukas to get an early victory with Team Penske. Malukas' best IndyCar results have come on ovals, especially short ovals. All five of his top five finishes in his career have come on ovals. His first two podium results each came at Gateway, second in 2022 and third in 2023. Last year, he was classified second in the Indianapolis 500, moving up a position post-race after a penalty disqualified Marcus Ericsson. In the Nashville finale, Malukas qualified second and look poised to be a threat for victory before having an accident in turn one when negotiating the back-maker Louis Foster.
Rasmussen's victory last year at Milwaukee should inspire some that Phoenix could be the site of their first career victory. Along with Malukas, Santino Ferruci should be encouraged entering this weekend. Nine of Ferrucci's 11 top five finishes in his career have come on ovals. Ironically, two of his three podium finishes have been on road and street courses. He has had a top five finish on an oval in every season he has competed full-time in IndyCar, including two last year, a pair of fifths at Indianapolis and Gateway. Ferrucci was eighth in oval points last year with 140.
Last year, Kyle Kirkwood picked up Andretti Global's first oval victory since 2018 when he won at Gateway in a race that turn into a bigger fuel conservation battle than expected. Though he won at Gateway, Kirkwood's only other top ten finish on an oval was sixth at Nashville. The other two Andretti drivers in 2025, Colton Herta and Marcus Ericsson, combined for zero top ten finishes on ovals, and the organization in its entirety, Marco Andretti's Indianapolis 500 also included, had an oval average finish of 17.1052.
A Return to Phoenix
IndyCar has a long history with Phoenix Raceway, and for the 21st century is has been fractured. While it hosted Indy Racing League events at the turn of the century, the series stopped racing at the circuit after the 2005 season. It would be an 11-year hiatus before the top division in American open-wheel racing returned to the one-mile oval. However, that second stint lasted only three season. Now, IndyCar returns after another eight-year break.
Not as many drivers as you think competing this weekend were around for the most recent Phoenix experience. The number is five, and two of them are past Phoenix winners. Scott Dixon extends back to the original run of Phoenix races, starting with the track's opening in 1964 on the USAC National Championship schedule, bridging splits between USAC and CART, and then CART and the IRL before ending in 2005. Dixon made three starts in the early 2000s, and his best finish was second in 2004. In 2016, he won on IndyCar's Phoenix return, leading 155 of 250 laps. He had top five finishes in all three appearances from 2016 to 2018.
Josef Newgarden is the most recent Phoenix winner as Newgarden took the 2018 race ahead of Robert Wickens, Alexander Rossi and Scott Dixon. Newgarden only led 30 laps. Will Power led the most laps in this race, but Power's race ended after he hit the wall when he got into the marbles after Rossi made a pass on the Australian. Newgarden took advantage of of taking tires under the last caution and he drove pass Wickens with four laps remaining to win the race.
Prior that wall contact, Power had finished on the podium in his first two Phoenix starts in 2016 and 2017. Rossi's third in 2018 was by far his best Phoenix finish. He had finished 14th in 2016, and he was 15th in 2017 after an accident.
The only other active driver who has started a Phoenix race is Graham Rahal. While Rahal was fifth in 2016, he was involved in an opening lap accident in 2017 and did not complete a lap, classified in last place. In 2018, he rebounded to finish ninth.
IndyCar held its preseason test at Phoenix Raceway last month.
Ed Carpenter Racing led the way with Rossi running the fastest lap over the two days at 20.6254 seconds. Newgarden was 0.0213 seconds off Rossi with Álex Palou in third, 0.0381 seconds behind. Christian Rasmussen made it two ECR cars in the top four, and Rasmussen was 0.0733 off his teammate. David Malukas rounded out the top five in the test, 0.0929 seconds slower than Rossi.
Patricio O'Ward took sixth with a lap at 20.7247 seconds, and then the three Andretti Global cars landed on the timing sheet. Kyle Kirkwood led the trio at 20.7302 seconds with Will Power (20.7867 seconds) and Marcus Ericsson (20.7956 seconds) behind him. Marcus Armstrong rounded out the top ten at 20.8165 seconds with the other two New Zealanders Dixon (20.8340 seconds) and Scott McLaughlin (20.8786 seconds) right behind him.
Rahal, Felix Rosenqvist, Rinus VeeKay, Louis Foster and Nolan Siegel were the final drivers to run in the 20-second bracket. Mick Schumacher was the fastest of the three rookies in 18th, 0.4154 seconds behind Rossi. Romain Grosjean and Christian Lundgaard rounded out the top twenty. Caio Collet and Dennis Hauger were the next two on the time sheet.
Kyffin Simpson, Santino Ferrucci and Sting Ray Robb rounded out the testing results. Robb was 0.7296 seconds off Rossi's top time.
How Bad is Not Completing the First Lap of the Season?
For two drivers, the first race of the 2026 IndyCar season could not have gotten off to a worse start. They have started more races this season than they have completed lap because Santino Ferrucci and Mick Schumacher didn't even make it through four corners in the St. Petersburg season opener.
Sting Ray Robb locked up going up the inside into turn four and with Robb sliding, he collided into Ferrucci, who nosed his car into the barrier, and Schumacher was collateral damage with no place to go but into the back of Ferrucci.
Some would look at such an incident and wonder if it is an omen for the rest of the season. If you could not get through one place, how could you expect a full season to be good? Well, is that the case?
With Ferrucci and Schumacher each failing to make it through one lap, there have now been 36 occasions since 1946 where a driver started the first race of the season and failed to complete a lap. It is actually the second consecutive season where it has happened. Last year, Will Power spun exiting turn three and Nolan Siegel and Louis Foster were collected in the accident.
This was actually the fourth time in the last six seasons where there has been an opening lap accident in the season opener where cars did not complete the opening lap. Prior to this run, it had not happened since 2011.
Is this a sign of a bad season to come?
It is not a great start.
Only twice has a driver failed to complete the first lap of the season and finished in the top five in the championship. Ten out of the first 34 drivers were able to finish in the top ten of the championship. Eighteen of the 34 drivers were outside the top fifteen in the championship at the end of that season.
The two best drivers were Josef Newgarden in 2021 and A.J. Allmendinger in 2006.
Newgarden was caught when Ryan Hunter-Reay spun going over the hill toward turn five at Barber Motorsports Park, and both drivers were out of the race. Newgarden recovered and finished second in the next race at St. Petersburg, and he had four consecutive top six finishes. He would go on to win twice and he ended up finishing second in the championship, 38 points off Álex Palou.
Allmendinger's 2006 season was peculiar even by modern standards. He was involved in a four-car accident at the start of the Grand Prix of Long Beach. He had a good recovery over the next three races, but he was then fired by RuSport. Allmendinger did end up landing at Forsythe Racing, where he won his first three races with the team. Allmendinger won five times that season, and was third in the championship despite leaving the team prior to the season finale to start his moving to NASCAR.
Newgarden and Allmendinger are the only drivers to win multiple times in a season after failing to complete the opening lap. Six other drivers have won a race in the season in which they failed to complete the opening lap.
The first to do it was Elmer George, who didn't even start the first lap of the 1957 season. George and Eddie Russo made contact on the pace laps for the Indianapolis 500 and neither took the green flag. Later that season, George won at Syracuse.
For the start of the 1996-97 Indy Racing League season, Robbie Buhl and Jim Guthrie had an accident on the first lap of the season at Loudon. Guthrie would go on to win three races later at Phoenix and Buhl would win in his return to Loudon, 364 days after he was unable to complete the first lap.
Jimmy Vasser could not make it one lap with his new team, Team Rahal, in 2002 as Vasser and Townsend Bell got together at the start of the Monterrey CART race. Nearly seven months later, Vasser took the checkered flag at Fontana in what was the fastest 500-mile race at the time.
Marco Andretti started his 2011 season flipping at St. Petersburg after contact with Hélio Castroneves and Scott Dixon at the start of the race. However, Andretti would later that season at Iowa, and he would finish eighth in the championship.
We saw it last year. Power did not make it through the first lap at St. Petersburg, but he would get his day of glory at Portland, where he took victory. It was the highlight of Power's season as he finished ninth in the championship.
Looking at the immediate aftermath, no driver has failed to complete the first lap of the season and then won the next race. Along with Newgarden in 2021, Vasser was second in the next race in 2002 at Long Beach, and Paul Tracy was second at Houston in 2006 after not completing the first lap of the season in the previous round. Along with those three, seven other drivers were in the top ten of the next race.
The good news is no driver has failed to complete a lap in the first two races of the season.
Shared Weekend History
This will be the fifth time IndyCar and the NASCAR Cup Series are running together at the same track on the same weekend. The first four occurred from 2020 to 2023, and all four times were at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The first get-together was over Independence Day weekend during the global pandemic in 2020. NASCAR was already scheduled to run the Brickyard 400 that weekend based on the original schedule. IndyCar had only contested one race at that point in 2020 and the Grand Prix of Indianapolis was added to the weekend to be run on Saturday July 4. It was just prior to NASCAR's second division race, which also took place on the IMS road course and was always scheduled to run on the IMS road course.
Over the next three years, every race that weekend was held on the IMS road course as NASCAR experimented with using the configuration in place of the Brickyard 400 on the oval.
Scott Dixon won two of the four IndyCar races held in companionship with NASCAR. Dixon won the 2020 race from pole position, but after a tough fight with Graham Rahal before Dixon took advantage of cautions and tire strategy. It was Dixon's second consecutive victory to open the season, and he went on to open that season with three consecutive victories before taking his sixth championship.
In 2023, Dixon entered the weekend with zero victories, but he was breaking the IndyCar record for consecutive starts. It was his 319th consecutive start, and Dixon won from 15th using impressive fuel conservation. It would spark an end to the season that saw him win three of the final four races and take second in the championship.
Will Power won the 2021 race held with NASCAR as he led 56 laps on the IMS road course with Romain Grosjean finishing second for the second time on the track that season. Alexander Rossi won the following year, but Rossi's car had improper weight ballast in his car. Rossi kept the victory, but the team was docked 20 points for the infraction. Christian Lundgaard was second.
On the NASCAR side, Kevin Harvick won the 2020 Brickyard 400 after Denny Hamlin suffered a right front tire failure while leading in turn one. It was Harvick's second consecutive Brickyard 400 victory and his third overall. In the first Cup race on the IMS road course, A.J. Allmendinger took a surprise victory as he was only competing in the road course races for Kaulig Racing. It was Allmendinger's first Cup victory in seven years and five days. Tyler Reddick won the 2022 race and Michael McDowell won the 2023 race.
In 2020, Chip Ganassi Racing had cars competing in each of the big races of the weekend, and the team fell a spot short of the sweep. Matt Kenseth was second in the #42 Chevrolet. Kenseth had taken over the car after Kyle Larson had been indefinitely suspended for using a racial slur during an sim racing event on Easter night of that year. Team Penske has also had drivers competing in both the IndyCar and Cup events, and it too fell a sport short of sweeping the weekend. In 2021, a day after Power's victory, Ryan Blaney was second behind A.J. Allmendinger.
Team Penske's success at Phoenix is not contained only to IndyCar. Penske has won six Phoenix Cup races, and it has won at the circuit in three of the last four seasons. However, five of those victories have come in the autumn race at the circuit. The only time Penske has won the early Phoenix race was in 2020 when Joey Logano took victory. Logano is a four-time Phoenix winner while Blaney won last season's Phoenix finale. Rusty Wallace won Penske's first Phoenix Cup race in 1998.
Fast Facts
This will be the first IndyCar race ever held on March 7.
After today's race, there will be 76 days in the calendar year that have never hosted an IndyCar race.
The only day remaining in the month of March to not host an IndyCar race will be March 8.
The other days that have not hosted an IndyCar race that are not in January, February or December are May 8, May 17, May 18, May 20, November 10, November 15 and November 20.
This will be the 26th Phoenix race to take place in the month of March. This will be the earliest Phoenix race in the calendar year. The previous earliest was March 11, which occurred in 1979. Gordon Johncock won the race driving for Patrick Racing. It was the first CART race.
Team Penske leads all teams with nine Phoenix victories.
McLaren is second amongst active teams in Phoenix victories with three despite the team having not run an IndyCar race at the track since 1979. Johnny Rutherford is responsible for all three victories (March 1975, March 1977, October 1978).
Scott Dixon's victory in 2016 is Chip Ganassi Racing's only Phoenix victory.
Five drivers have won consecutive Phoenix races: Al Unser (November 1969-March 1970), Bobby Unser (swept 1972 races), Gordon Johncock (October 1977-March 1978), Rick Mears (1989-1990), Tony Kanaan (2003-04).
Honda has won four of the last seven oval races after only winning once in the previous 14 oval races.
Four drivers had their first career victory come at Phoenix (Gary Bettenhausen, Roberto Guerrero, Robby Gordon and Sam Hornish, Jr.).
The average starting position for a Phoenix winner is 4.39 with a median of third.
The last four Phoenix races have been won from the fifth, sixth or seventh starting position.
The last four Phoenix races have been won from the fifth, sixth or seventh starting position.
Four Phoenix races have been won from outside the top ten, three of those have been won from 19th or worse (Mike Mosley from 19th in March 1974, Roberto Guerrero from 22nd in 1987 and Buddy Lazier from 26th in 2000).
The average number of lead changes in a Phoenix race is 5.359 with a median of five.
IndyCar's most recent visit to Phoenix in 2018 had 12 lead changes, the most ever for a race at the circuit. The previous two Phoenix races had two lead changes and four lead changes respectively.
The average number of cautions in a Phoenix race is 4.628 with a median of four. The average number of caution laps is 35.628 with a median of 32.
Predictions
Let's be honest, we should just pick Álex Palou every week, because it is going to be right almost 50% of the time. If it isn't Álex Palo, this is Scott McLaughlin's weekend and he is going to lead north of 175 laps. Josef Newgarden does finish in the top five and it is a good day as all three Team Penske cars finish in the top ten. The field will get through the first lap and they will go at least 55 laps before the first caution. Two of the rookies do not see the checkered flag. Christian Lundgaard has his best oval result. Christian Rasmussen touches a barrier this weekend. I am not saying it is going to be bad, but it will happen. Alexander Rossi will leave the weekend frustrated. Sleeper: Marcus Ericsson.
