Marcus Armstrong is about to begin his second season driving in IndyCar, and he is preparing for the new challenge laid before him.
He will be piloting the #11 entry for all 17 races of the year, meaning he will be running races on an oval for the first time in his career.
Last year, Armstrong came over to IndyCar following a three-year stint in Formula 2, and was tasked with driving the season’s road and street courses for Chip Ganassi Racing.
He quickly warmed up to the idea of running some of the ovals as the season progressed, but the team chose to have its veteran racer Takuma Sato drive the team’s fourth car for all five oval rounds.
This year the 23-year-old will get to try his hand at the new discipline, and he is grateful to have such a large talent pool within his team to gather information and advice from.
“Yeah, there’s a lot of people in the team with a lot of experience with winning races and championships,” said Armstrong. “Certainly Scott [Dixon], I share a driver lounge with. He’s more than happy to share everything with me, as far as I know, which is extremely helpful.
“Dario [Franchitti], as well, like I said. I have to say that all the strategists, all the engineers, they have very good information to share.
“When it comes to race day, usually I will go to a few people that I usually go to to get a second opinion on, whether it be strategy or race craft in one way or another, and then it’s down to me to go and do it.
“I’ve always been one to study data, so I would say that it’s business as usual, really. Last year when I was having my first race weekends, it was quite a lot of information coming at me.
“Ultimately you just need to drive the race car as fast as you can around the circuit, if you put it really simply. Certainly this year I’m going to try and get into the details as much as possible and improve.”
Chip Ganassi Racing is running five full time cars this season, and is said to have roughly 180 people at its Indianapolis race shop, including plenty of personnel with specialized experience to draw from.
Whether that’s the six-time series champion Scott Dixon, four-time champion turned driver coach Dario Franchitti, or a number of tenured engineers assigned to his car, there is always someone that can answer Armstrong’s questions as he thinks of them.
As a young driver who is going to be tasked with a completely new type of racing format this year, Armstrong will certainly benefit from having nearly every resource he needs within reach.
“Certainly there’s a lot to be learned from Scott [Dixon] and Alex [Palou], who have obviously proven themselves. I think there’s eight championships between them. Clearly there’s some expertise there to be drawn upon.
“I’m in a very fortunate position really where, yeah, I’m surrounded by fantastic people and a great team, strong teammates to work with, share data with, and push forwards with.”
The first race of Armstrong’s sophomore season is less than two months away, with his first oval race coming at the 108th Indianapolis 500 on May 26.
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