Our fourth 2020 IndyCar Team Preview takes us to Ed Carpenter Racing, a team that has not won a race in the last three seasons and it will see a few changes.
Spencer Pigot has left the team after spending four seasons in the organization. Ed Jones has also left after spending one season as the road and street course driver in the #20 Chevrolet. Pigot's future is still unknown but Jones will be running for Audi in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters in 2020. One driver remains while one veteran has been called in and one rookie gives the team hope to rekindle its winning ways and returning to championship contention down the road.
2019 Ed Carpenter Racing Review
Wins: 0
Best Finish: 2nd (Gateway)
Poles: 0
Championship Finishes: 14th (Spencer Pigot), 20th (Ed Jones), 23rd (Ed Carpenter)
2020 Drivers:
Ed Carpenter - #20 Autogeek Chevrolet
Carpenter's abbreviated 2019 season started with his home race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. While Carpenter was not starting on pole position this time around but he started second and stayed in second for a good portion of the race while Simon Pagenaud led. While it appeared Carpenter was biding his time, just trying to be there at the end, Alexander Rossi soared through. Carpenter didn't have the fight he hoped for in the closing lap and ended up a respectable sixth.
Ed Carpenter Racing was completely lost at Texas. Both cars were off the pace and attrition lifted the team to a 13th place finish for Carpenter but two laps down. The team turned it around at Iowa with both cars spending much of the race in the top five but Carpenter had an accident in turn two for the second consecutive year and that ended his night with 37 laps to go.
Carpenter's season ended with a sixth place finish at Pocono and a runner-up finish at Gateway. The Gateway finish was aided with a caution before his final stop, cycling to the front and allowing him to get ahead of Tony Kanaan for second and then charge down Takuma Sato in the dying laps only for Carpenter to finish 0.0399 seconds short of victory.
Numbers to Remember:
2: Consecutive seasons with a podium finish. The only other time Carpenter had podium finishes in consecutive seasons was from 2009 to 2014.
6: Carpenter was sixth in oval points in 2019 with 161 points, behind Simon Pagenaud, Josef Newgarden, Alexander Rossi, Santino Ferrucci and Will Power.
12.8: Carpenter's average starting position in 2019, his worst since 14.2 in 2015.
Predictions/Goals:
It is the same every year for Ed Carpenter: Win at least one race and preferably the Indianapolis 500.
Carpenter does five or six races a season depending on how IndyCar's scheduling does. He is not running for a championship, there is no reward for being the top oval driver and there is no sign Carpenter is all that concern with the #20 Chevrolet scoring a respectable finish in the owner's championship. It comes down to winning races.
Now, are top five finishes nice? Yes. If you offered Carpenter five top five finishes right now but could not guarantee him any victories, he would take it. He does need to show value and he does not get that if he is in the top five for one race and somewhere between ninth and 16th for the other four races.
Though he hasn't done it, Carpenter is painstakingly close to winning Indianapolis. He hasn't put it together in one race yet but he is there. We know the speed is there and the last two years we have seen Carpenter been strong for an entire 500-mile race. In 2018, it got him a runner-up result. In 2019, it got him a sixth place finish after spending much of the race in the top five. He is there. It will come down to putting the pieces together and maybe having one or two drivers having an off day.
Carpenter has to go out there and finish ahead of his rookie teammate Rinus VeeKay in the five oval races. He needs to be the top dog. Along with doing that he needs to have at least one race where he at the front for its entirety. He needs to qualify better in 2020 and he needs to lead laps at a race other than Indianapolis.
Consider this: Since focusing on only oval races, Carpenter has had double-digits laps led in only three races: Indianapolis 2014, Texas 2014 and Indianapolis 2018. The 2014 races were the first two of Carpenter's oval-only career.
It would be nice to see him have a great day at Richmond or Iowa. Really anywhere would be great but it would be nice to see it at somewhere different.
Conor Daly - #20 U.S. Air Force Chevrolet
It was another part-time season for Daly but 2019 turned out much better than he expected.
Daly's season started at Indianapolis with Andretti Autosport and it was the best Indianapolis 500 of his career. He started 11th, his best in the Indianapolis 500, ran much of the race in the top ten and he finished 10th, his first top ten in the Indianapolis 500 and he completed all 500 miles for the first time in his career.
When Max Chilton decided to step away from oval competitions, it created an opening at Carlin and Daly was drafted in. He had a strong Texas race, working his way to 11th but nearly pulled out a top ten. At Iowa, he was 16th. At Pocono, he was 11th. At Gateway, Daly had a strong night and was a top ten runner. The late caution shuffled the field up but he finished sixth after starting 18th.
When Marcus Ericsson was called to Alfa Romeo F1 duty because of Kimi Räikkönen's neck injury possibly sidelining the Finn, Schmidt Peterson Motorsports drafted Daly in for the #7 Honda at Portland. Daly qualified ninth but his race ended in the first turn in the first lap when Graham Rahal bowled into about three cars at the start.
Daly had one more shot, the season finale at Laguna Seca with Andretti Autosport. It was a good race with Daly just outside the top ten but possibly capable of making a push for a top ten result only to spin and get stuck on the curbs in the Andretti hairpin. His season ended with a 22nd place result.
Numbers to Remember:
45: Starts in Daly's IndyCar career.
8: This will be Daly's eighth different team in IndyCar.
6: Daly is the sixth different driver to share the #20 Chevrolet with Ed Carpenter since 2014.
52: Races since ECR had a podium finish on a road/street course (Second at Watkins Glen with Josef Newgarden in 2016).
73: Races since ECR had a victory on a road/street course (Toronto 2015 with Josef Newgarden).
Predictions/Goals:
I think Daly can get ECR back to a level it has not seen since Newgarden but not necessarily be a regular contender for victories. It would be asking a lot of Daly to turn ECR into a championship challenger, especially since he will not be full time.
Daly is going to have limitations. ECR is not as stacked as it was with Newgarden but it showed signs of promise. We have seen Daly step into unfamiliar cars and get results. When substituting for an injured James Hinchcliffe in 2015 he got a sixth place finish at Belle Isle. In 2016, his first full season in IndyCar, he put together a string of top ten finishes with Dale Coyne Racing, including a strong run in the Grand Prix of Indianapolis and a runner-up finish at Belle Isle. At Foyt, he picked up a top five at Gateway. With Carlin last year, he had remarkable runs on the ovals and when he stepped into Andretti Autosport equipment he matched the capabilities of the equipment beneath him.
Daly has to get at least five top ten finishes and get at least one top five finish. He could win a race but that is asking a lot from a team that hasn't had a podium on a road/street course in nearly four seasons.
History shows this is only a cameo for Daly. The road/street course driver at ECR does not usually last more than a season. Daly has to use this 13-race schedule as an audition for a full-time seat in 2020. He has to outperform the results Pigot and Jones put up in 2019. He really should aim to score about 20 points per race because Pigot averaged 19.7 points per race in 2019 and Jones averaged 16.69 points in an identical schedule.
Twenty points per race could have Daly challenging for the top twenty in the championship and that would be a good showing for a driver that is not full-time.
Rinus VeeKay - #21 SONAX/Autogeek Chevrolet
Fresh off the 2018 Pro Mazda championship, VeeKay moved up to Indy Lights in 2019 and it did not take long for him to continue his winning ways.
VeeKay was fifth in the first race at St. Petersburg but he won the second race, which came after contact with Oliver Askew on the second lap of the race. No one could touch Askew in Austin and VeeKay finished second and fourth in those two races. He was third in the first race on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course and won the second race, giving him a one-point championship lead.
A third place finish in the Freedom 100 combined with an Askew victory dropped VeeKay to second in the championship. A blocking penalty in the first Road America race after he ran wide in turn seven and rejoined the track in front of Robert Megennis ruined a shot to get back on top of the championship. The penalty dropped him to a seventh place result. He rebounded with a victory in the second Road America race.
His season took a hit at Toronto. While he was third in the first race, an accident while battling Aaron Telitz for the lead in the second race led to a massive swing in the points. VeeKay went from three points behind Askew to 25 points back after a ninth place finish in the second race.
Askew would win the next three races at Mid-Ohio and Gateway while VeeKay had a pair of thirds and a runner-up finish, increasing VeeKay's championship deficit to 52 points. VeeKay won the first Portland race and he was second in the second race but Askew finished a position behind VeeKay on both days.
All Askew had to do was start both Laguna Seca races to clinch the title and there was nothing VeeKay could do. The Dutchman ended the season sweeping the Laguna Seca weekend, leading every lap from pole position in both races but he was second in the championship, 21 points back.
Numbers to Remember:
33.333: Winning percentage in 48 Road to Indy starts.
9: Different tracks won at in VeeKay's Road to Indy career. Only Watkins Glen is not on the 2020 IndyCar schedule.
8: VeeKway will be the eighth Dutchman to start an IndyCar race joining Arie Luyendyk, Robert Doornbos, Jan Lammers, Nicky Pastorelli, Charles Zwolsman, Arie Luyendyk, Jr. and Cornelius Euser.
Predictions/Goals:
VeeKay is a highly anticipated addition to the IndyCar grid and the 19-year-old from The Netherlands in some ways has higher expectations than his Road to Indy contemporary Oliver Askew.
Askew did win the U.S. F2000 and Indy Lights championships to VeeKay's Pro Mazda title, and Askew had a higher winning percentage in 48 races, all of which both he and VeeKay competed in, but VeeKay was set for a ride with Ed Carpenter Racing prior to the 2019 Indy Lights season concluding while Askew was more unsure of his 2020 plans despite the championship and scholarship funding.
Rookie of the year is the obvious goal but the other goal for VeeKay is to be more in line with Colton Herta's results in 2019. That is a stretch. I do not foresee VeeKay picking up two victories and finishing seventh in the championship but VeeKay has to at least show he is capable of being ECR's best hope for the next few seasons.
ECR has been lost since Newgarden left. VeeKay could fill the void and at least give the team some direction for the next three or four seasons.
With no full-time teammate for comparison I think VeeKay's measuring stick is how many times he is the top ECR finisher. There are 17 races and I think if he is the top ECR finisher at least nine or ten times that is a respectable rookie season, especially if he beats Daly and Carpenter head-to-head. If VeeKay can be the top ECR driver in three oval races and top Daly at least six times I think that will calm any worries heading into 2021.
Top ten in the championship is going to be difficult. If VeeKay is in the top 12 then that is a great showing and it will likely get him rookie of the year. I think VeeKay needs at least one top five finish, especially if Daly is showing the car has top five pace. The 2019 rookie class really set the bar high. One top five and six to nine top ten finishes would be outstanding for any rookie, including VeeKay.
The 2020 NTT IndyCar Series season opens on Sunday March 15th with the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. NBCSN's coverage begins at 3:30 p.m. ET.
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