The seventh round of the 2026 NTT IndyCar Series season requires the most time and attention. It is more than a three-day weekend with two practice sessions, qualifying and a warm-up before the main event on Sunday. It requires more than a weekend, and frankly more than a week. We are 12 days from the 110th Indianapolis 500, far away and yet time is disappearing quickly.
Thirty-three cars are entered this year, 18 Chevrolet and 15 Hondas. On the entry list are nine past winners, the seventh consecutive year to feature at least eight past winners. Three of the last four years have seen a first-time winner of this race.
Every team has already been on track after the two-day test held over April 28-29. However, those test results do not tell us everything, and there will be much to learn over the next few days.
What is the schedule?
Practice will begin Tuesday May 12 and for four days cars will be on track from noon to 6:00 p.m. ET.
The qualifying draw will be held on Friday May 15 at 6:15 p.m. after final practice.
On Saturday May 16, practice will be held at 8:30 a.m. for one hour.
There is a change to the qualifying format this year.
Qualifying will start at 11:00 a.m. and run until 5:50 p.m. At the end of that session, the fastest nine cars will transfer for the Fast 12 session set for Sunday. Tenth through 15th will transfer to the “Final 15” session, also held on Sunday. In the Final 15, each car will get one run with the top three from that session filling out the Fast 12.
With only 33 cars entered, there will not be a last chance qualifying session.
Practice will begin Sunday May 17 as the remaining 15 cars will have an hour session at 1:00 p.m. The Final 15 session is scheduled for 4:05 p.m. The Fast 12 will follow at 5:00 p.m. Each car will have one attempt with the top six advancing to the Fast Six session. The final round of qualifying will be held at 6:25 p.m. with each of the top six getting one run for pole position.
Monday May 18 will have a post-qualifying practice at 1:00 p.m., and it will run for two hours.
What is the forecast?
The forecast looks favorable for practice week. Tuesday will be partly cloudy with a chance of precipitation at 2% and a high will be around 78º F. Temperatures will remain in the mid 60s over the next few days, and the chance of precipitation will remain low.
On Friday, chance of increase to about 40% and the temperature should break 70º F.
Qualifying weekend will see the warmest temperatures of the week. Saturday will see the temperature jump to the high of 83º F, but the chance of storms remains high, as there is a 47% of precipitation. Sunday will see the temperature remain consistent with Saturday. The chance of precipitation will drop to 24%.
The temperature will remain around the low 80s for Monday practice, but the chance of thunderstorms increases to 70%. The chance of storms remains over 40% through Carb Day on Friday May 22.
The Rookie Class
Four rookies are entered in this year's race. Three are full-time drivers.
Caio Collet will drive the #4 Chevrolet for A.J. Foyt Racing. Dennis Hauger is driving for Dale Coyne Racing in the #18 Honda after winning the Indy Lights championship last year. Collet was second to Hauger in Indy Lights after Hauger won six races to Collet's three. Mick Schumacher is driving for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing in the #47 Honda. Schumacher spent the last two seasons competing for Alpine in the FIA World Endurance Championship.
Jacob Abel is back for his second Indianapolis 500 attempt. Last year, Abel failed to qualify for the race driving Dale Coyne Racing. This year, Abel will attempt the race in the #51 Abel Motorsports Chevrolet.
Who is not there?
Six drivers from last year's race are not entered this year.
We start with the pole-sitter. After being the fastest qualifier on debut, Robert Shwartzman is not back at the Speedway as the Prema organization has been absent from the entire IndyCar Series this season. Along with Shwartzman, Callum Ilott has also been sidelined due to the Prema issues.
There will be no double attempt this year, as Kyle Larson is not returning for a third attempt at the Indianapolis 500 after running the last two years with Arrow McLaren.
Colton Herta is off in Formula Two as he pursues a Formula One opportunity with the Cadillac program. Herta was hoping to run an additional entry with Andretti Global this year before a Formula Two round was rescheduled to Canadian Grand Prix weekend, which falls on the same weekend as the Indianapolis 500.
Devlin DeFrancesco is not back after he returned in 2025 with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing. DeFrancesco had also missed the 2024 race when he was sidelined.
For the first time since 2005, Marco Andretti is not entered for the Indianapolis 500, as Andretti has retired from competition. Andretti made 20 Indianapolis 500 starts with five top five finishes and eight top ten finishes in his career. Unfortunately, his Indianapolis 500 career ended with eight consecutive finishes outside the top ten.
This will be the first time since 1957 that the Indianapolis 500 will not feature a member of either the Foyt, Unser or Andretti families.
Along with the four rookies, Romain Grosjean and Katherine Legge return to the Indianapolis 500. Both last competed in 2024. Grosjean will be driving the #18 Honda for Dale Coyne Racing as he competes full-time. Legge will pilot the #11 Chevrolet run in partnership between HMD Motorsports and A.J. Foyt Racing.
What trends should we know for the Final 15/Fast 12/Fast Six?
Typically, topping the no-tow report in practice means you are likely going to make the Fast 12. With three more spots, there is a greater chance to be qualifying on Sunday.
Last year, Kyle Kirkwood topped the no-tow report on the first two days of practice and then qualified 25th on time before moving up to 23rd on the grid after two Team Penske entries were penalized for modified attenuators found prior to the Fast 12 session.
Kirkwood was the third driver since 2016 to top a no-tow report on a practice day and not start in the top 12. It was the second consecutive year it has happened. Colton Herta topped the no-tow report for one day in 2024 before he qualified 13th.
Based on average no-tow report position last year, only two of the top six made the Fast 12. They were Josef Newgarden and Scott McLaughlin. Only six of the top 12 based on that average made the Fast 12. Robert Shwartzman's average no-tow report position last year was 13th-best over the four practice days.
Friday practice is the one day where every team will run with the qualifying boost levels of 150 Kilopascals (kPa). In 2024, nine of the top 12 from Friday practice made the Fast 12. Last year, seven of the top 12 from Friday made it. Those drivers were Álex Palou, Scott McLaughlin, Scott Dixon, Will Power, Christian Lundgaard, Felix Rosenqvist and Takuma Sato. The five drivers who did make the Fast 12 but were not in the top 12 on Friday were Shwartzman (13th), Newgarden (16th), Marcus Ericsson (19th), David Malukas (20th) and Patricio O'Ward (23rd).
The top five cars based on average overall practice session results made the Fast 12 last year, but only one other car in the top 12 made the Fast 12. Shwartzman was 32nd with an average overall practice position of 26.5. Rosenqvist and Sato both had an average practice result worse than 20th last year and made the Fast 12 at 20.5 and 21.75 respectively.
The fastest drivers overall each day were Will Power Dixon (Tuesday), Álex Palou (Wednesday), Josef Newgarden (Thursday) and Scott McLaughlin (Friday).
Last year, Palou became only the second driver in the last 13 Indianapolis 500s to win the race after topping a pre-qualifying practice session. The only other was Ryan Hunter-Reay in 2014, who topped the Monday pre-qualifying practice day.
Over the four practice days last year, Palou was third, first, sixth and third.
How much do testing results carry over?
Few would have expected Caio Collet would have topped the open test, but he did. A usual suspect was right behind him, Josef Newgarden. Conor Daly was third and not far behind those two cars was Palou in fourth. Hélio Castroneves rounded out the top five.
The rest of the top ten is a pretty good list of drivers. Patricio O'Ward, a twice runner-up of the Indianapolis 500, was sixth. Two-time Indianapolis 500 winner Takuma Sato was seventh. The all-time leader in laps led in Indianapolis 500 history, Scott Dixon, was eighth. Then you had Team Penske's David Malukas in ninth and 2016 Indianapolis 500 Alexander Rossi in tenth.
Outside of the driver at the very top, there were no other stunners in test and there was nothing being experience and success leading the way. Will anyone else breakthrough? There were some notable names down the order.
If there was any take away from this year's test, it was a number of teams were not running their dedicated Indianapolis 500 car, meaning it is hard to take the results as gospels. None of the Chip Ganassi Racing cars were their Indianapolis 500 cars, and Palou was still fourth overall was eighth. Palou was using the car he won with at Long Beach. If Palou is that quick in a car that was swapped from road course setup to oval setup, how good will his dedicated car for this race be?
It feels like testing should be taken with a grain of salt, and we could see a shift over this week that counters the results of a few weeks ago.
Who wants testing results to carry over the most?
Jacob Abel, who was 12th overall in the test driving for his family's team. Last year, Abel was never close to making the field of 33. Many were intrigued with Abel ending up 12th, and it would be a big boost to his confidence and possibly his future if Abel can have a respectable month.
Who makes a gain this week?
Take Andretti Global as an example. The three Andretti cars ranked 18th (Will Power), 27th (Kyle Kirkwood) and 30th (Marcus Ericsson). Andretti had a good race last year prior to Ericsson and Kirkwood being demoted from second and sixth respectively for illegally modified hybrid covers found post-race. Qualifying was not great for Andretti last year, and the team has not been the most competitive in recent years at Indianapolis. Does the team find something or will this year be another case of fighting from behind?
Scott McLaughlin was 15th overall. In his first three years, McLaughlin's pace was not the most explosive. In the last two years, he has been a proper contender. With his two teammates both in the top ten, it is likely we see McLaughlin move forward.
Collet topped testing but his A.J. Foyt Racing teammate Santino Ferrucci was 16th. Ferrucci has finished in the top ten in all seven of his Indianapolis 500 starts. In the last four years, he has never started worse than 15th. Last year, he went from 15th to fifth. The previous two years saw Ferrucci start on the second row, and he was third in the 2023 race. In his first three Indianapolis appearances, he started 23rd, 19th and 23rd with finishes of seventh, fourth and sixth.
While Patricio O'Ward was in the top ten, none of the other three Arrow McLaren entries ranked in the top twenty. Christian Lundgaard was 21st with Nolan Siegel in 25th and Ryan Hunter-Reay in 28th. Last year, Lundgaard ranked 18th or worse in the first three practice days and still made the Fast 12.
While Alexander Rossi was in the top ten, the other two Ed Carpenter Racing entries ranked outside the top 25. Ed Carpenter was 26th and Christian Rasmussen was 29th. After starting no worse than fourth in seven of ten Indianapolis 500s from 2013 to 2022, Carpenter has not started better than 13th the last three years. Rasmussen has never been a strong qualifier. He has started in the top ten in four times in his 38 career starts. Even at Phoenix in March, a race where Rasmussen led the second-most laps and looked to be the best car for most of the race, he started 18th that day, and the Dane has started 24th and 18th in his first two Indianapolis 500s.
Is Dreyer & Reinbold Racing legitimately quick?
In each session at the two-day open test, Conor Daly was toward the top. Daly led the morning session on the first testing day, and his best time was still good enough for third overall. Add to it, Jack Harvey had the fastest no-tow lap over the two-day test.
Last year, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing was on the verge of a stunning victory with Ryan Hunter-Reay in a backup car. Partly at the front due to fuel strategy and timely cautions, Hunter-Reay was holding a good pace entering the final pit cycle before the car stalled on the final stop. The year before that, Hunter-Reay made the Fast 12 driving for D&R and he ranked no worse than 14th over the four practice days in 2024. Daly was tenth in the 2024 race driving for D&R.
This team has only run the Indianapolis 500 since 2014. It has three top ten finishes in the last five Indianapolis 500s after having only one top ten finish in the seven Indianapolis 500s before that. Since 2021, D&R's average finish in the Indianapolis 500 is 16.556 while it was 19.9 from 2014 through 2020.
Daly joins the team on a run of four consecutive top ten finishes coming with three different teams. In each of those years, Daly has made up positions from his starting position, he has never started between than 11th. Harvey's "500" results are not as good. He has never started better than 20th for this race, and his lone top ten finish in eight starts was ninth in 2020. His only only finish in the top half of the field was 16th in 2018.
Who is not being mentioned that could receive more attention going into qualifying?
Marcus Armstrong was a real contender for the Fast 12 last year, and he possibly had the pace to make the Fast Six prior to his practice accident on Saturday morning ahead of qualifying. Instead of fighting to start on one of the first four rows on Sunday, Armstrong was fighting to make the race. He did with some comfort, but Armstrong lost an opportunity to be a factor. Instead of starting in the first third of the grid, Armstrong was 30th on the grid and he drove up to 18th.
Armstrong was ranked in the top ten on three of four practice days last year with his worst practice result being 14th.
Who has yet to be mentioned?
For those keeping score at home, 28 of the 33 entered driver for this year's race have been mentioned. Who hasn't?
Kyffin Simpson, who was 30th in the test, and he has started 18th and 13th in his first two Indianapolis appearances. As a rookie, Simpson was the final finisher to complete all 200 laps, and he was 21st. As a sophomore, Simpson was caught in a turn two accident when Kyle Larson spun, and Simpson was out after 91 laps.
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing does not have to worry about bumping this year, and it is probably happy it will not have to worry about it. While Sato was seventh at the test, Schumacher was 20th with Graham Rahal in 22nd and Louis Foster in 32nd. There is some breathing for Schumacher and Rahal. Foster would have been in a precarious situation and might have already been subconsciously preparing himself for a tense qualifying weekend.
We have not mentioned Juncos Hollinger Racing! Rinus VeeKay was 14th in the test. Sting Ray Robb was 24th. After never starting worse than seventh in his first five Indianapolis 500 appearances, VeeKay started 31st last year with Dale Coyne Racing and was 27th in the race after spinning in the pit lane. Robb was also caught in the Kyle Larson spin and was classified in 23rd.
Last year, Juncos Hollinger Racing picked up its first top ten finish in the Indianapolis 500 when Conor Daly was eighth. The team's average finish in the Indianapolis 500 is 21.3636. Even before the Team Penske penalties, JHR was set for its best starting position at Indianapolis last year. Daly slid up to 11th on the grid. Prior to lat year, the best JHR starter in this race was 17th. Its average starting position is 23.4545 and a JHR car has started 26th or worse in six of the team's 11 successfully qualified entries.
What will this race mean for the championship?
It feels too early to say this race is a tipping point for the championship even if this is the race with the most points on the table. A driver could leave with a maximum of 65 points and could make up 60 points up on other competitors.
There is no guarantee Álex Palou will exit Indianapolis as the championship leader. Palou is only 27 points ahead of Kyle Kirkwood entering practice week, and David Malukas and Christian Lundgaard are the only other drivers within 60 points of Palou, 52 points and 55 points back respectively.
In all likelihood, either Palou or Kirkwood will leave as the championship leader. It will likely require a victory for either Malukas or Lundgaard to take the top spot. For the rest of the field, this is a chance to breathe some life into a title run.
Josef Newgarden is 75 points behind Palou. Scott Dixon and Patricio O’Ward are 89 points back. Scott McLaughlin and Graham Rahal are 96 points back. The next closest driver is Marcus Armstrong, 114 points from the top.
It feels like the top nine are the only drivers with a realistic title shot after the first six races, and if anyone wants to make a step toward a championship, they must have a positive Indianapolis 500.
This is the seventh race of the season. The only times the “500” has been this late in the season was 2020 when the race was delayed due to the pandemic, and prior to that 1915, 1921 and 1922. There are still 11 races remaining after this race, which is not much different from most other seasons following Indianapolis, but there will be no greater chance this season to make up ground. Nobody can allow Palou to run away.
Unlike last season where a Palou victory would be the knockout blow for the title in May, the championship is not as firmly in his control, but another triumphant May and the rest of the field will be staring at a long summer ahead.
