Track Walk: Long Beach 2019

Alexander Rossi looks to get back to the top step of the podium at Long Beach

The fourth round of the 2019 NTT IndyCar Series season is the 45th Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach. Entering this weekend the top seven drivers in the championship represent seven different teams. Josef Newgarden continues to lead in the championship with 125 points and his drive from 16th to fourth at Barber kept up his streak of three consecutive top five finishes. Newgarden is the only driver with top five finishes in every race this season. The only other driver with top ten finishes in all three races is Alexander Rossi. Newgarden has four consecutive top ten finishes at Long Beach but his only top five finish was third in 2017. He has only led four laps in the track, three of which came last year.

Coverage
Time: Coverage begins at 4:00 p.m. ET on Sunday April 14th with green flag scheduled for 4:42 p.m. ET.
Channel: NBCSN
Announcers: Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Kelli Stavast, Marty Snider and Robin Miller will work pit lane.

IndyCar Weekend Schedule 
Friday:
First Practice: 1:00 p.m. ET (45 minutes)*
Second Practice: 5:00 p.m. ET (45 minutes)*
Saturday:
Third Practice: 12:00 p.m. ET (45 minutes)*
Qualifying: 2:45 p.m. ET (Live coverage on NBCSN)
Sunday:
Warm-Up: 12:00 p.m. ET (30 minutes)*
Race: 4:42 p.m. ET (85 laps)

* - All practice and qualifying sessions are available live with the NBC Sports Gold IndyCar pass.

Can Honda Do What Toyota Couldn't?
The first 44 editions of the Grand Prix of Long Beach saw Toyota as the title sponsor. The Japanese manufacture was synonymous with this race and the Toyota branding around the circuit blended in with the palm trees and skyline surrounding the track. It all changes this year with Acura taking over as title sponsor for the famous race.

While Toyota had such a long history sponsoring this race and Toyota had a brief period in IndyCar and one that was fairly successful, a Toyota-powered car never won the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. While there will be no Acura-badged engines on the grid this year, although Jack Harvey's car will carry Acura branding, Acura is a subsidiary of Honda and there will be 14 Honda-powered cars lining up this Sunday.

Honda enters having won the last two races, including sweeping the podium in the Honda sponsored event at Barber last week. Honda has won the last two years at Long Beach and each year it has had two cars on the podium. In last year's race, Honda had five of the top six finishers.

Before Josef Newgarden won at St. Petersburg last month, Honda had won nine of the previous ten street course races and had 20 of 30 podium finishers in those ten races. While Newgarden won at St. Petersburg and Will Power finished third, Scott Dixon finished second, Felix Rosenqvist finished fourth and led 31 laps and Honda had seven of the top ten finishers. Not only did Honda sweep the podium at Barber but it had four of the top five, eight of the top ten and the non-Penske Chevrolet teams finished 16th through 22nd with the only two Hondas those seven Chevrolet entries beat being Graham Rahal, who retired because of an electrical issue, and Colton Herta, who retired due to a fuel pressure issue. Of the ten Chevrolet entries at Barber, only five finished on the lead lap while 12 of 14 Honda teams completed all 90 laps.

In the last two Long Beach races, Honda has led 161 of 170 laps. In each of the last two races, Honda has had seven of the top ten starters.

Toyota did not set the bar high for Honda to clear. In seven years Toyota competed in the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach it only managed two podium finishers. Cristiano da Matta was the runner-up finisher in 2001 driving for Newman-Haas Racing and the year before Jimmy Vasser was the third place finisher driving for Chip Ganassi Racing. In that time frame, Toyota didn't even win pole position for the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach with Vasser starting second in 2000 and da Matta starting second in 2002.

Honda enters this year's race with 17 Long Beach victories. Alexander Rossi's victory last year broke a time with Cosworth for most Long Beach victories for an engine manufacture.

Will Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Back Up Barber Success?
With all the talk about Honda, attention turns to the team that brought Honda its most recent IndyCar triumph. Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing shut out the front row in qualifying with Takuma Sato taking pole position and Graham Rahal starting second. Sato went on to lead 74 laps on his way to his fourth IndyCar victory and his first from pole position.

Rahal retired after an electrical failure but he entered that race fastest in the warm-up prior to the race and during the first stint Rahal remained in the shadow of his teammate. Both RLLR cars were consistently running in the 71-second bracket while the rest of the field struggled with tire degradation and could not match the pace. If his car had not let him down it would have been interesting to see if Rahal could have added pressure to Sato down the stretch.

RLLR has won a race in five consecutive seasons and Sato's victory in the third race of the season is the earliest RLLR has won a race since Bobby Rahal won the second race of the 1992 season at Phoenix, the second race in the team's history. Rahal won the championship that season.

The team has been hovering on the periphery of championship contention since 2015. Graham Rahal was alive for the title entering the final race of 2015 at Sonoma only to finish fourth in the championship after Sébastien Bourdais spun him in turn seven. Rahal won twice that season and had six podium finishes. The problem for the team is it has not put together those type of seasons on a consistent basis. Rahal would finish fifth in the championship in 2016 but his championship position has declined in each of the last two seasons and prior to those two seasons RLLR had not had a top five championship finisher since Buddy Rice in 2004.

Sato has never won consecutive races but he did famously finish second at São Paulo in 2013 the race after his first career victory at Long Beach. Rahal swept the Belle Isle races in 2017 but the only other time RLLR has won consecutive races was with Kenny Bräck at Motegi and Milwaukee in 2001. The team had double top ten finishes at Austin and likely would have had double top ten finishes again at Barber had Rahal's car not suffered the electrical issue. The team had both cars finish in the top ten in six of 17 races last year but in none of those races did both drivers finish in the top five and the team has not had double top five finishers since the 2005 Indianapolis 500 when Vitor Meira finished second and Danica Patrick finished fourth.

After picking up the team's first Barber victory, Sato and Rahal will aim for RLLR's first Long Beach victory. Graham Rahal was the runner-up finisher in the 2013 race, matching his father's best finish in this race, which came in 1988 and in three consecutive races from 1991 to 1993 races, the latter two races coming with the RLLR team, and Jimmy Vasser, who finished second to Michael Andretti after starting on pole position in 2002.

Last year, Rahal finished fifth at Long Beach and the RLLR team had four top five finishes in the five street course races.

Who Can Make It Four-For-Four?
Through the first three races there have been three different winners from three different teams and none of those teams are Chip Ganassi Racing and Andretti Autosport. Add to the situation that six different teams have won the last six Long Beach races and seven different drivers have won the last seven trips to Shoreline Drive and it appears IndyCar could be set for another new face on the top step of the podium.

Scott Dixon has two runner-up finishes from the first three races and those results have him second all-time in runner-up finishers on 42 with the Barber result elevating him ahead of Hélio Castroneves in that category. Dixon only trails Mario Andretti's record of 56 runner-up finishes. The New Zealander won this race in 2015 when Ganassi had Chevrolet engines. Dixon enters second in the championship on 98 points, 27 markers behind Josef Newgarden.

Alexander Rossi won last year's Long Beach race from pole position and he enters fourth in the championship on 84 points. He has fifth place finishes at St. Petersburg and Barber. Rossi has never won at the same track twice but at the five tracks he has won at, the only track where he has multiple podium finishes in Pocono. Rossi's 12 podium finishes have come at 11 different tracks.

At this point the last two seasons Sébastien Bourdais had already won a race but this year Bourdais has not been as fortunate. The good news for the Frenchman is since his engine failure at St. Petersburg he has rebounded with a fifth place finish in Austin and a third place finish at Barber. Bourdais is a three-time Long Beach winner and he was runner-up finisher two years ago to James Hinchcliffe. However, since 2011, Bourdais has only led five laps at Long Beach, four of which came last year.

James Hinchcliffe and Ryan Hunter-Reay are both past Long Beach winners and they are sixth and seventh in the championship. Hinchcliffe is on 71 points and a point behind Bourdais. Hunter-Reay is tied with Will Power on 66 points but Hunter-Reay holds the tiebreaker with an eighth place finish. Hinchcliffe has three consecutive top ten finishes at Long Beach but Hunter-Reay has finished outside the top ten in six consecutive trips to Long Beach. Hunter-Reay has only four top ten finishes in 13 Long Beach starts and his 2010 victory is his only top five result.

Marco Andretti rounds out the top ten in the championship on 61 points and Andretti has five top ten finishes in ten Long Beach starts but he has never finished in the top five at Long Beach and the six laps he has led on this track all came in his first Long Beach start in 2009.

Felix Rosenqvist is a point behind Andretti and while he salvaged a top ten result at Barber, Rosenqvist gets a chance to add to his street circuit conquests this weekend at Long Beach. He led 31 laps and finished fourth in his IndyCar debut at St. Petersburg last month. Long Beach was not on the Indy Lights schedule in 2016 when Rosenqvist ran part of the season but he won at St. Petersburg and swept the Toronto races, making his batting average .750 on street circuits that year. The Swede is renowned for his street course success with victories in the Pau Grand Prix, at the Norisring and he won the Macau Grand Prix twice and had a runner-up finish to boot.

Marcus Ericsson is coming off the first top ten finish in his IndyCar career and Ericsson has put together two encouraging races from poor starting positions the last two times out. While he only got the result in the one race, Ericsson had promising pace at St. Petersburg before the qualifying session from hell where very few drivers had any chance to get a flying lap in and the number of red flags trapped the Swede and he started 18th. In this race, he suffered a radiator puncture, ending his debut early. He worked his way into the top ten at Austin only to have a penalty for an unsafe pit release shuffle him to the rear of the field.

IMSA
Long Beach is the third round of the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship and after a pair of endurance races totaling 36 hours in Florida, the series now has its shortest race of the year, a 100-minute race on Shoreline Drive. This race will feature only the professional classes of DPi and GTLM meaning this race will feature 21 cars.

Cadillac is two-for-two this season and the Daytona-winning #10 Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac of Jordan Taylor and Renger van der Zande and the Sebring-winning #31 Action Express Racing Cadillac of Pipo Derani and Felipe Nasr tied on 67 points. Before last year's race where the #5 Action Express Racing Cadillac took the victory, Wayne Taylor Racing had won three consecutive years at Long Beach.

Acura is third in the championship with the #7 Team Penske Acura of Ricky Taylor, who was a part of all three of Wayne Taylor Racing's Long Beach victories, and Hélio Castroneves, who won at Long Beach in Indy Lights in 1997 and he won the 2001 Grand Prix of Long Beach. The #7 Acura has 58 points after a third and a fourth at Daytona and Sebring respectively.

The #5 Action Express Racing Cadillac of Filipe Albuquerque and João Barbosa looks to defend its Long Beach victory and those two are tied with the #54 CORE Autosport Nissan of Colin Braun and Jon Bennett in the championship on 54 points.

The #85 JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac of Misha Goikhberg and Tristan Vautier are sixth on 50 points, three points ahead of the #6 Acura of Dane Cameron and Juan Pablo Montoya and the #55 Mazda of Jonathan Bomarito and Harry Tincknell. Will Owen will have Kyle Kaiser join him in the #50 Juncos Racing Cadillac. Simon Trummer and Stephen Simpson are tied with Owen on 44 points and they will split the #84 JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac. Oliver Jarvis and Tristan Nunez rounds out the championship on 40 points in the #77 Mazda.

Patrick Pilet and Nick Tandy took the GTLM championship lead with 61 points after the #911 Porsche won at Sebring. Daytona winner Connor De Phillippi is two points back in the #25 BMW Team RLL entry and Tom Blomqvist is back for this second race of the season. Joey Hand and Dirk Müller sit on 56 points in the #66 Ford GT, tied with the #912 Porsche of Earl Bamber and Laurens Vanthoor but Hand will miss this weekend's race due to the flu. Sébastien Bourdais will pull double duty and replace the American in the #66 Ford GT this weekend.

Corvette has not won in GTLM since last year at Long Beach and the team is still looking for its 100th IMSA victory. Jan Magnussen and Antonio García are fifth in the championship on 55 points. Magnussen has won twice at Long Beach, including with García in 2014. Ryan Briscoe and Richard Westbrook is two points behind the Corvette in the #67 Ford GT. The #24 BMW of John Edwards and Jesse Krohn are on 50 points. Last year's Long Beach winners Oliver Gavin and Tommy Milner round out the GTLM championship on 46 points in the #4 Corvette.

The Bubba Burger Grand Prix of Long Beach will take place at 5:00 p.m. ET on Saturday April 13th.

GT4 America
Another 21 sports cars will be on track in Long Beach in the inaugural GT4 America race at the event. Long Beach is the second of eight sprint rounds on the 2019 GT4 America schedule.

The season opening round was at St. Petersburg last month and Ian James and Jade Buford split the two races but Buford will not be at Long Beach. James leads the championship and he will return in the #50 Panoz entry. Gar Robinson is second in the championship on 33 points, two behind James and Robinson will be in the #74 Camaro with his teammate Shane Lewis fifth in the championship on 15 points in the #72 Camaro. Spencer Pumpelly is five points behind James and Pumpelly is back in the #66 TRG Porsche.

Rounding out the Pro entries are Michael Cooper, who scored 12 points at St. Petersburg in the #10 Blackdog Speed Shop McLaren, Nicolai Elghanayan, who did not score any points in the #71 Marco Polo Motorsports KTM and Matthew Brabham, who makes his debut this season in the #20 CRP Racing Porsche.

Preston Calvert leads the Am class sprint championship with 40 points in the #51 Panoz. Calvert split the St. Petersburg races with Alan Brynjolfsson, who is seven points behind Calvert in the championship in the #7 Park Place Motorsports Porsche. Marko Radisic is third on 30 points and he will be in the #22 BMW for Precision Driving Tech.

Tony Gaples has 22 points and he will be back in the #10 Blackdog Speed Shop McLaren. Mark Klenin rounds out the top five on 20 points in the #62 KPR McLaren. Jarett Andretti started on pole position in the first race from St. Petersburg but retired from that race. He rallied in race two with a third place finish and the driver of the #18 Andretti Autosport McLaren heads to Long Beach with 15 points.

The GT4 America race is scheduled for 1:00 p.m. ET on Sunday April 14th.

Fast Facts
This will be the sixth IndyCar race to take place on April 14th and the first since Michael Andretti won at Long Beach in 2002.

This will be the fifth time the Grand Prix of Long Beach will take place on April 14th. Mario Andretti won on April 14, 1985, Al Unser, Jr. took the victory in 1991, Jimmy Vasser in 1996 and the aforementioned Michael Andretti in 2002.

This year's race is the earliest the fourth round of a season taking place in one calendar year has been since 1996 when Long Beach was the fourth race on April 14th. The fourth round of the 1996-97 IRL season took place on March 23, 1997 at Phoenix but the first two races of that season where August 18, 1996 at Loudon and September 15, 1996 at Las Vegas.

Six of the 11 IndyCar seasons since reunification have had four different winners in the first four races of the season.

Team Penske, Chip Ganassi Racing and Newman-Haas Racing are all tied for most Long Beach victories at six apiece.

Five drivers have scored their first victory at Long Beach (Michael Andretti, Paul Tracy, Juan Pablo Montoya, Mike Conway and Takuma Sato).

Not only has seven different drivers won the last seven Long Beach races but those seven drivers all represent seven different nationalities.

There have not been consecutive American winners at Long Beach since Al Unser, Jr. in 1994-95 and Jimmy Vasser in 1996.

Alexander Rossi could join Mario Andretti (1984-85), Al Unser Jr. (1988-91 and 1994-95), Alex Zanardi (1997-98), Paul Tracy (2003-04) and Sébastien Bourdais (2005-07) to win the Grand Prix of Long Beach in consecutive seasons.

The average starting position for a Long Beach winner is 4.228 with a median of three.

Rossi's victory from pole position last year was the first time the pole-sitter won at Long Beach since Bourdais in 2007. It was the first time a front row starter won at Long Beach since Dario Franchitti in 2009.

Eight of the last 11 Long Beach races have been won from the second row.

The average number of lead changes in a Long Beach race is 4.97 with a median of five.

The last three Long Beach races have had six lead changes.

Only three times has the Long Beach race not had a lead change (1984, 1987 and 2001).

The average number of cautions in a Long Beach race is 2.857 with a median of three. The average number of caution laps is 11.628 with a median of 12.

Only three times has the Long Beach not had a caution (1985, 1987 and 2016).

Possible Milestones:
Ryan Hunter-Reay is one start away from passing Jimmy Vasser for 15th all-time.

Graham Rahal is one top five finish away from 50 top five finishes.

Takuma Sato is one top ten finish away from 50 top ten finishes.

Ryan Hunter-Reay needs to lead 45 laps to reach the 1,500 laps led milestone.

Simon Pagenaud needs to lead 64 laps to reach the 1,000 laps led milestone.

Alexander Rossi needs to lead 61 laps to reach the 600 laps led milestone.

Graham Rahal needs to lead 20 laps to reach the 400 laps led milestone.

Predictions
I am sticking with Alexander Rossi until he gets a victory and he defends his Long Beach victory but a Penske and a Ganassi car will join him on the podium. Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing has one car finish in the top ten and another finish outside the top ten. At least one driver will make the Fast Six for the first time this season. A.J. Foyt Racing continues its slide. Simon Pagenaud will not be the worst finishing Team Penske driver. Sleeper: Felix Rosenqvist.

Track Walk: St. Petersburg 2019

IndyCar wakes in the final days of winters under the blue skies of Florida

We're back! The first round of the 2019 NTT IndyCar Series season takes place on the streets of St. Petersburg for the 16th Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. There are 24 entries for the season opener, matching the number of entries for last year's St. Petersburg race. Last year's race saw the most cautions in the history of the event with eight but there was also an event record 11 lead changes. Four previous St. Petersburg winners are entered in this year's race and two of them could tie Hélio Castroneves' record of three victories in this event.

Coverage
Time: Coverage begins at 12:30 p.m. ET on Sunday March 10th with green flag scheduled for 1:37 p.m. ET.
Channel: NBCSN
Announcers: Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Jon Beekhuis, Kelli Stavast, Marty Snider and Robin Miller will work pit lane.

IndyCar Weekend Schedule 
Friday:
First Practice: 10:45 a.m. ET (45 minutes)*
Second Practice: 2:15 p.m. ET (60 minutes)*
Saturday:
Third Practice: 10:15 a.m. ET (60 minutes)*
Qualifying: 2:30 p.m. ET (Live coverage on NBCSN)
Sunday:
Warm-Up: 9:15 a.m. ET (45 minutes)*
Race: 1:37 p.m. ET (110 laps)

* - All practice and qualifying sessions are available live with the NBC Sports Gold IndyCar pass.

Staying on Top
It is a new season but there are plenty of drivers that want to pick up where they left off, starting first and foremost with Scott Dixon.

The defending champion will be going for his sixth title. Dixon has won 44 races, third most all-time and he is eight victories behind Mario Andretti for second. He will be trying to successfully defend a title for the first time in his career and for the first time during the DW12-era. The last driver to successfully defend a title was Dario Franchitti, who won three consecutive titles from 2009-11.

St. Petersburg is one place Dixon has yet to conquer. He has never won at the track but he does have three runner-up finishes in the event. He has only led three times at the track. He led 36 laps on his way to second in 2006, 21 laps before he clobbered the barrier in 2010 and he led 37 laps before another runner-up finish in 2012. He does have six top ten finishes in the seven races held during the DW12-era and he has made it out of the first round of qualifying in 12 of 14 St. Petersburg races.

Dixon has won the season opener twice before in his career. Both victories came at Homestead in 2003 and 2008. Dixon won the title each of those seasons.

Alexander Rossi finished 57 points behind Dixon in the 2018 championship and the Californian will look to make up for a missed opportunity one year ago. Rossi went from 12th to second in last year's race and was challenging Robert Wickens for the victory. On the final restart, Rossi made contact with Wickens and while Rossi was able to continue as Wickens hit the barrier, Rossi dropped to third in the final results. He did start the 2018 season with three consecutive podium finishes and it set up a season where Rossi was no worst than third in the championship throughout the season.

Rossi closed out 2018 with seven consecutive top ten finishes and he had a top ten finish in four of five street course races last year. Last year's St. Petersburg race was one of two races where Rossi started outside the top ten with the other being the Indianapolis 500.

Josef Newgarden was unsuccessful in defending his IndyCar championship last year but he has never been far off the top in his time with Team Penske. Newgarden has never been worse than eighth in the championship since joining Team Penske and he has been in the top five of the championship after 29 of the 34 races over the last two seasons, including 16 consecutive races entering the season opener. He has not been outside the top ten of the championship since he was 12th after the 2016 Grand Prix of Indianapolis. Dating back to the 100th Indianapolis 500, Newgarden has been in the top five of the championship after 40 of the last 45 races.

Similar to Dixon, Newgarden does not have a great record at St. Petersburg. His seventh place finish last year is his best at this track and he has only started in the top ten twice here. He has never led a lap in this race in his previous seven starts. Seventh was his best finish on a street course last season after he had four top five finishes out of the five street course races in 2017.

While Dixon, Rossi and Newgarden are three drivers expected to go to the wire for the championship, Sébastien Bourdais is looking for his third consecutive St. Petersburg victory. Bourdais was a bit of fortunate in last year's race being in the right place at the right time when Wickens and Rossi got together but his two victories have come from the back of the grid. He started 21st and 14th in this race the last two year's and Bourdais' last four victories have come from starting positions outside the top ten after his first 33 victories all came from inside the top ten.

While Bourdais has won at St. Petersburg the last two years but his victory last year was his only top ten finish on a street course and he started outside the top fifteen in the last three street course races.

Class of 2019
The IndyCar veterans will have a tough task this season with the 2019 rookie class adding to an already deep grid. Three drivers will make their IndyCar debuts at St. Petersburg and two other rookie drivers have a handful of IndyCar starts between them.

Colton Herta enters coming off a stunning preseason test at Austin. The Harding Steinbrenner Racing driver was fastest overall over the two days and he was fastest in three of the four session with him being second quickest in the other session. Herta made his debut last year at Sonoma but he finished 20th after starting 19th.

Herta has made four starts at St. Petersburg in Indy Lights. In 2017, he set fastest lap in the first race on his way to a runner-up finish and he had a grand slam in the second race, leading every lap from pole position while setting fastest lap. Last year, he finished third in the first race while again setting fastest lap but in the second race an accident took him out while running second.

One other rookie driver has experience at St. Petersburg and that is Chip Ganassi Racing's Felix Rosenqvist. The Swede ran the 2016 Indy Lights weekend while driving for Belardi Auto Racing. In the first race, Rosenqvist had his car stuck in the wrong engine mode but still finished seventh. In the second race, he had a grand slam, one of two grand slams he had that season with the other coming in the first Toronto race. He won the second race from Toronto that year while leading every lap from pole position but did not pick up fastest lap.

Rosenqvist was not far off Herta in the Austin test. He was sixth fastest overall and nearly a tenth faster than his teammate Dixon.

There was a third rookie in the top ten of the Austin test and that was Dale Coyne Racing's Santino Ferrucci and he was faster than his veteran teammate. Ferrucci made four starts last year between Belle Isle, Portland and Sonoma with his best result being 11th in the season finale at Sonoma. This will be his first trip to St. Petersburg in any competition but the good news for Ferrucci is Dale Coyne Racing has a good track record at this track. The team has had at least one car finish in the top ten in five of the seven St. Petersburg races during the DW12-era, including two top ten finishes in 2017.

Marcus Ericsson will fill the seat vacated at Schmidt Peterson Motorsports for the injured Robert Wickens who continues his recovery from his Pocono accident. Ericsson will be moving to IndyCar after five years and 97 starts in Formula One. The second Swede on the grid has seemed to fit in at Schmidt Peterson Motorsports and he has been praised as having a similar driving style to teammates James Hinchcliffe. However, Ericsson was in the back half of the Austin testing results at 14th but he was just over a quarter-second behind Hinchcliffe, who was ninth.

The final driver making a debut this weekend is Ben Hanley, who will be driving for a team making its IndyCar debut in DragonSpeed. Hanley and DragonSpeed were not at the Austin test but have been testing at Sebring in preparation for this event. Hanley will be making his first single-seater start since 2010, when he drove in Superleague Formula for the Olympiacos CFP team, which was operated by GU-Racing International. Hanley and team are coming into this race after finishing third in the LMP2 class in the 24 Hours of Daytona.

Who Needs to Start Strong?
Everyone is going to have a bad race or two but some drivers need to get off to a great start early.

Will Power has won twice at St. Petersburg but he has not finished in the top ten since he finished second in 2015. While he has won ten races over the last three seasons, Power has finished outside the top fifteen in 18 races in the same time period and ten of those finishes were of 20th or worse. Poor starts have been a contributing factor with Power's average championship position over the first five races of the season the last three years has been 11.2 and he has been in the top five of the championship after only one of the 15 races that made up the first five races of the last three seasons.

Ryan Hunter-Reay's annual hiccups have been well documented. Few drivers have had more gremlins ruin promising results than Hunter-Reay. He has five consecutive top ten finishes at St. Petersburg, four of which are top five finishes but Hunter-Reay also has at least one finish outside the top fifteen in one of the following two races in each of the last five seasons. He has had at least four finishes outside the top fifteen in eight consecutive seasons and he had six finishes outside the top fifteen last year.

Simon Pagenaud has been a consistent driver for his entire IndyCar career. He enters the 2019 season with ten consecutive top ten finishes, only one retirement over the last two seasons and only nine retirements in 135 starts. However, Pagenaud's fantastic results in 2018 brought him little success. He had only two podium finishes last year in his second winless season in four years with Team Penske. His 31 laps led were the fewest since his rookie year in Champ Car in 2007. He did not win a pole position last season for the first time since 2013. Before last year's 13th finish at St. Petersburg, Pagenaud had four consecutive top five finishes in this event, including runner-up finishes the previous two years.

Tony Kanaan is coming off the worst year of his career. He didn't score a top five finish in a race for the first time since 2000 and his 16th place championship finish was his worst since 19th in 2000. The 44-year-old Brazilian is heading to one of his better tracks. He has eight top five finishes and 11 top ten finishes in 14 starts and while he has finished outside the top ten in the last two St. Petersburg races, those finishes 12th and 11th after he started sixth and tenth in those two respective races.

James Hinchcliffe started 2018 with five consecutive top ten finishes but he ended the season with five consecutive finishes outside the top ten. In 2017, he started the year with three consecutive top ten finishes, including a victory at Long Beach but he ended that season with four finishes outside the top ten in the final five races. His first career victory came at St. Petersburg in 2013 and he has three top five finishes and four top ten finishes in seven starts. He has completed 758 of 760 laps in this race since 2012.

Road to Indy
Along with IndyCar, all three Road to Indy series begin their respective 2019 seasons at St. Petersburg.

In Indy Lights, ten cars are entered for the season opening round with Pro Mazda champion Rinus VeeKay moving up to the series with Juncos Racing. VeeKay won five of 16 races with ten podium finishes and 15 top ten finishes. His teammate will be Dalton Kellett, who moves over from Andretti Autosport.

Andretti Autosport has three cars entered this year with Ryan Norman the lone returning driver from 2018. Oliver Askew moves up after finishing third in Pro Mazda and Robert Megennis will be in the third Andretti Autosport entry after finishing fifth in Pro Mazda.

Belardi Auto Racing will also have three cars on the grid with Zachary Claman rejoining the series after running part-time in IndyCar in 2018. His two teammates will be Frenchman Julien Falchero, who ran in the GP3 Series last year, and Lucas Kohl, who moves up from U.S. F2000.

BN Racing moves up to Indy Lights and it will have David Malukas as one of its drivers. Malukas was fourth in the Pro Mazda championship last year. Briton Toby Sowery will run a second car in partnership with Team Pelfrey.

Belardi Auto Racing has won at least one Indy Lights race at St. Petersburg the last three years. Andretti Autosport has won a race at St. Petersburg the last two years.

The Indy Lights races will take place at 1:15 p.m. ET on Saturday March 9th and at 10:05 a.m. ET on Sunday March 10th.

The newly renamed Indy Pro 2000 series will have 14 cars on the grid for its opening round.

Kyle Kirkwood moves up after winning 12 of 14 races on his way to the U.S. F2000 championship and he will drive for RP Motorsport. The Italian team entered the series last year and won twice with Briton Harrison Scott.

Parker Thompson will look to breakthrough and win the championship with Abel Motorsports after finishing third and second in the previous two years with Exclusive Autosport. DEForce Racing's Moisés de la Vara poises to be another championship challenger as he won the 2017-18 NACAM Formula 4 Championship.

Juncos Racing will field two cars as it looks for its third consecutive title. Sting Ray Robb joins the team while Rasmus Lindh moves up after being U.S. F2000 vice-champion in 2018. Juncos Racing has six victories at St. Petersburg in this category.

Indy Pro 2000 will race at 12:40 p.m. ET on Friday March 8th and at 11:25 a.m. ET on Saturday March 9th.

The largest field of the junior series belongs to U.S. F2000, which has 21 entries and includes many promising young drivers.

Cape Motorsports has three Americans in its lineup with Darren Keane moving over from Newman Wachs Racing while Reece Gold and 2018 Team USA Scholarship winners Braden Eves enter the series. Two promising Americans to keep an eye on are Pabst Racing's Yuven Sundaramoorthy and dual national Hunter McElrea, who is part New Zealander.

The series also has promising international drivers. Jay Howard Driver Development has entered Danish driver Christian Rasmussen, who finished third in Formula 4 United States Championship last year and Matthew Round-Garrido, the defending Northern Irish Formula Ford champion. Manuel Suliamen leads the NACAM Formula 4 Championship and the Mexican will drive for DEForce Racing. Cameron Shields joins the series finishing as vice-champion in the Australia Formula 3 Premier Series and he will drive for Newman Wachs Racing. Eduardo Barrichello will drive for Miller Vinatieri Racing.

The first U.S. F2000 race will be on Friday March 8th at 11:45 a.m. with the second race on Saturday March 9th at 12:20 p.m. ET.

GT4 America
St. Petersburg is not only the opening round for IndyCar and the three Road to Indy series but it is the first sprint round of the GT4 America series, the series formerly known as Pirelli World Challenge's GTS class.

Twenty cars are entered for the first sprint round of the season. Alan Brynjolfsson won one of the two SprintX races from Austin and he is in the #7 Park Place Motorsports Porsche this weekend. Three other Porsches are on the grid with Spencer Pumpelly driving the #66 TRG Porsche, Michael Dinan in the #27 Porsche for Flying Lizard Motorsports and Thomas Collingwood will pilot the #69 BGB Motorsports Group Porsche.

Blackdog Speed Shop has switched to McLaren after famously running Chevrolet Camaros and it has brought back Michael Cooper, who will drive the #10 McLaren with Tony Gaples in the #11 McLaren. Andretti Autosport is fielding a McLaren and Jarett Andretti will drive the team's #18 McLaren.

Cooper and Pumpelly are two of eight professional drivers on the grid. Ian James is back in the #50 Panoz. Three of the professionals will drive Ford Mustangs with Ian Lacy driving the #12 Ford for his own team while James Pesek and Jade Buford will drive the #40 Ford and #41 Ford respectively for PF Racing. Nicolai Elghanayan has the lone KTM X-Bow on the grid and he will drive the #71 entry for Marco Polo Motorsports. Gar Robinson rounds out the professional field in the #74 Robinson Racing Chevrolet.

Other notable amateur drivers on the grid include Jason Bell in the #2 GMG Racing Audi, Preston Calvert in the #51 Panoz, Mark Klenin in the #62 KPR McLaren and Shane Lewis in the #73 Robinson Racing Chevrolet.

The first race for GT4 America will be at 4:00 p.m. ET on Saturday March 9th with the second race scheduled for 11:20 a.m. ET on Sunday March 10th.

Fast Facts
This will be the third IndyCar race to take place on March 10th and the first since Cristiano da Matta won at won at Monterrey in 2002. The only other race held on March 10th was the California 500 in 1974, which Bobby Unser won. Both those winners went on to win the championship that year.

Team Penske has not won at St. Petersburg the last two years. The only other time Team Penske has failed to win successive St. Petersburg races was 2003 and 2005 and the team was not entered in the 2003 race.

Honda has won the last two St. Petersburg races after Chevrolet won the first five St. Petersburg races during the DW12-era.

While Team Penske has eight victories in this race, the only other teams with multiple St. Petersburg victories are Andretti Autosport and Dale Coyne Racing and those two teams have only won this race twice each.

Chip Ganassi Racing is one victory away from 107 victories, which would tie the team with Newman-Haas Racing for second most in IndyCar history.

Scott Dixon and Sébastien Bourdais have each won four times when starting outside the top ten. They are tied with Al Unser, Jr. and Dan Wheldon for most victories from outside the top ten in IndyCar history.

Scott Dixon has won at 23 different tracks, the third most in IndyCar history. He is one behind Dario Franchitti for second all-time. Mario Andretti holds the record having won at 26 different tracks.

Graham Rahal is the only American driver to have won the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

Marco Andretti is coming off a fifth place finish at Sonoma. It was the first time Andretti ended a season with a top five finish in his career. He has not had top five finishes in consecutive races since he finished second, fifth and fifth in 2015 at the Belle Isle doubleheader and Texas.

Zach Veach was running at the finish of all 17 races in 2018 but he finished on the lead lap only eight times.

Takuma Sato has started in the top ten in six consecutive St. Petersburg races and five of those have been top five starting positions.

Ed Jones will make his third St. Petersburg start with his third different team. He finished tenth in 2017 with Dale Coyne Racing and he finished eighth last year with Chip Ganassi Racing.

Charlie Kimball's best finish at St. Petersburg was ninth in 2012 while Carlin teammate Max Chilton has never finished in the top fifteen at this track.

Spencer Pigot has not finished on the lead lap in his prior three St. Petersburg starts.

Matheus Leist and Jack Harvey both enter their sophomore season looking for their first career top ten finish.

No driver has won at St. Petersburg in IndyCar and Indy Lights. Marco Andretti, Josef Newgarden, Zach Veach, Ed Jones, Felix Rosenqvist and Colton Herta have all won in Indy Lights at St. Petersburg.

The last driver to win on debut in IndyCar was Buzz Calkins at Orlando on January 27, 1996.

The last race to have two rookie drivers finish 1-2 was on July 1, 2007 at Mont-Tremblant with Robert Doornbos taking the victory over Neel Jani.

The average starting position for a St. Petersburg winner is 5.9333 with a median of four.

None of the previous seven St. Petersburg races have been won from the front row.

The best starting position for a St. Petersburg winner in the DW12-era is fourth.

The pole-sitter has won at St. Petersburg twice, Hélio Castroneves in 2007 and Will Power in 2010.

The average number of lead changes in a St. Petersburg race is 6.4667 with a median of seven.

The average number of cautions in a St. Petersburg race is 4.4 with a median of five. The average number of caution laps is 19.333 with a median of 20.

Every St. Petersburg race has had at least two cautions.

Possible Milestones:
Ryan Hunter-Reay needs to lead 45 laps to reach the 1,500 laps led milestone.

Simon Pagenaud needs to lead 64 laps to reach the 1,000 laps led milestone.

Alexander Rossi needs to lead 63 laps to reach the 600 laps led milestone.

Graham Rahal needs to lead 21 laps to reach the 400 laps led milestone.

Predictions
Alexander Rossi isn't screwing around this year and he wins the season opener. At least two rookies finish in the top ten but the top qualifying rookie isn't the top finishing rookie. Someone from outside the top twenty finishes at least ten positions better than there starting position but none of those drivers cause a red flag during qualifying. Josef Newgarden gets his best St. Petersburg finish. Max Chilton gets his best St. Petersburg finish and finishes ahead of Charlie Kimball. Jack Harvey gets his best St. Petersburg finish. Sleeper: Takuma Sato.