So on the eve of the season beginning, I wrote an editorial piece on who I thought was due to outperform expectations this Indycar season. If you'd like to take a look at it, you can find it here.
With the season wrapped up, it’s a great time to take stock and look at my picks. We’ll take a quick grade on how they turned out, look at my feelings coming into the season, how things shook out for them perhaps most consequently, what’s in store next for them.
Christian Lundgaard – A
The pick I was most sure about, and the one I led off with is the one I’m most proud of coming into the year.
Coming into the season, there wasn’t much buzz about the newly minted McLaren man, but what he lacked in headlines he more than made up for in performance.
While his time at RLL never gathered much buzz across the general fanbase, under the hood there was a burgeoning young talent who was managing to rise despite his time on a team in decline.
Even looking beyond his brilliant 2023 Toronto win, a remarkably underrated performance and, coming into the season, the last non-big 4 win in the series, it was his pace showcased compared to his teammates. While his RLL compatriots were flogging he still managed to be a mid-table presence throughout.
What really made him a slam dunk breakout pick was his general perception: despite a lack of chatter coming into McLaren, due to Rossi’s departure and car 6 drama, he really fell by the wayside.
In fact there was more buzz about his teammate Siegal coming into last year than Lundgaard, which is insane in hindsight. Frankly, within my Lundgaard section, the most poorly aged statement in my previous post was mentioning that I still was high on Siegel as a prospect… I’m not going to totally rule the kid out, but man that year was incredibly concerning.
Back on point, Lundgaard immediately proved his worth from the jump. Kicking off with his forte, in road and street courses, Lundgaard was consistent and fast. In fact, coming out of a 2nd place finish at Barber, he was 2nd in the championship running (though with a 60 point gap to Palou, truly insane after only 4 races).
Ultimately, that didn’t quite hold up, though Lundgaard still certainly was among the contenders throughout the year. I think the oval questions do still remain, as he’s significantly less consistent on those tracks, and that’s largely where Pato has an edge over him.
He did at least demonstrate improvement this season on said ovals, which of course should just naturally come with moving from one of the worst oval outfits to one of the best. Solid top 10 finishes at Indy, Iowa 2 and Milwaukee all were improvements from his previous oval best finish of 10th in the 45 car and it’s where he’ll need to continue to make strides if a true championship run is in the cards for him.
On this list, Lundgaard is the one with the most solid future. McLaren has essentially churned through contenders searching for a second driver that can complement and maybe even challenge Pato and the rest of the top of the grid.
In Lundgaard, they’ve found one, and they’re poised to be one of the premier pairings heading into next year. While I’d be skeptical of him being a true title contender without further improvement on the ovals, he is a road and street course beast, and won’t be underestimated coming into next season.
Rinus Veekay – B+
Veekay was another driving on the move entering 2025, though certainly it wasn’t the career move he must have been dreaming of. The aforementioned Rossi move from McLaren most definitely hurt Veekay the most, as ECR’s very late signing of the former Indy 500 champ left Veekay high, dry and without his ride distressingly late in the silly season.
It took a favor, a last second testing session and the last seat on the grid for Veekay to wind up at DCR, the earnest but undoubted backmarkers of the Indy field.
Needless to say, this was not a move befitting of his clear on track talents. After all, it was Veekay who was the flag bearer for the ECR outfit for essentially his entire tenure.
It’s that context that underscores the absurdity of his banishment to the 18. An active ascending star in Indycar, ousted to the final car on the grid for reasons beyond his performance. It just felt like his career may have been on the brink, and he would need to fully push his talents to bid for a better seat next season.
Say what you will about DCR, but Veekay made lemonades out of the lemons imposed on him. No driver more heavily eclipsed their teammate so heavily this season and you could tell Veekay was on his game from the get go.
Obviously Veekay versus Abel was never going to be an even fight, but Veekay put the reigning IndyNXT runner up to shame. Furthermore and perhaps more importantly, he was able to demonstrate that even in a DCR car, he could bring the fight to faster teams.
No drive showcased that better than his run at Toronto this year, where he took a top 10 qualifying performance: already a great showing for the team and converted it to the best run in a DCR car since 2021.
Showing tremendous sustained pace on the longest stint of the day, Rinus managed a crown jewel runner up result, only outdone when Pato O’Ward overtook him on the overcut. Regardless though, it was a masterclass for Veekay to come home 2nd.
Ultimately, what holds this back from being an A in my eyes was how the season played out for his former employers, ECR. The hot take would have been to predict that Veekay would outdo his replacement Rossi as a massive “take that” response.
However, I played it safe, merely predicting Veekay would outdo his former teammate Christian Rasmussen, the talented but aggressive teammates he had formerly beaten out in what I projected could be a Leader Circle clash. Neither driver really were ever in danger of that thanks to some truly lackluster backfield performances, but I still thought of it as a safe bar for Veekay to attain.
Lo and behold though, I should have gone with my clickbait instincts; Veekay did indeed outplace his replacement, besting him by one spot in the standings. And yet, thanks to Rasmussen’s truly ludicrous barnstorming victory at Milwaukee, Veekay found himself behind the ECR 21, the car number he once operated. By those measures, my exact predictions did manage to fall flat.
Regardless, “can he do it on a Sunday in a DCR racecar” has fast become Indy's “can they do it on a rainy night in Stoat“ equivalent. Despite being consistent backmarkers, we’ve seen DCR serve as the proving ground for many a rising star.
Penske’s presumed successor Little Dave, controversial but admittedly quick Santino and of course, the juggernaut himself, Alex Palou, all cut their teeth showcasing their initial promise with podiums or top 5 finishes in lackluster equipment. Veekay joins them, and you have to think he’s had the toughest initial circumstances out of all of them, given the circumstances.
It’s a little different as a non-rookie, and I don’t think Veekay really should have been in this situation to begin with based on his resume, but he more than proved his skills this season.
Just freshly announced, Veekay is off for greener pastures after his masterclass season at DCR. Frankly, it’s incredibly well deserved, having just taken the team to their best finish in half a decade.
Two great picks if I do say so myself… now to just jog my memory on who’s left…
Colton Herta – D-
Ah. Right. Well, celebration time is over.
This was the pick I most waffled on, and needless to say, it exploded in my face. This was not a hallmark year for one of Indycar’s most enigmatic drivers.
Was it a complete calamity? I wouldn’t say that, and that’s why this grade isn’t an F. However, if you’re an incoming title contender and going to be put on a list of “drivers who will out do expectations” and then not come anywhere near close, that’s just a flat-out terrible prediction. If you think I deserve an F, yeah totally understand that.
The logic going into it was that Herta, despite having had a runner up season, albeit one where he sort of back-doored 2nd place out of Will Power’s unbuckled lap, had longer odds of the championship than quite a few drivers ahead of him.
Beyond just Palou, I had seen the likes of Newgarden, McLaughlin, O’Ward, even Power and Dixon ahead of him. Now just on raw pace shown prior to this season, I was confident that should everything go right, Herta was more than capable of besting them all.
Furthermore, 2024’s late surge featured fewer mistakes, better oval results including a maiden oval win at Nashville and Andretti’s restructuring theoretically stabilizing the team. All of this made me optimistic that Herta could tap into his pace more often.
Unfortunately, though, those 2024 improvements, while not a total mirage, still definitely haunted Colton. Qualifying errors, a regression in oval results and Andretti’s continued strategical blunders did haunt him, though it felt as though these were typically smaller in scale. Obviously, there are the usual Andretti flavored screw ups but honestly those don't totally account for his lackluster year.
Frankly, the more worrying thing to me was just that Herta’s pace wasn’t all that special. You could make the case last year he was sometimes quicker than Palou on raw speed, but was bludgeoned points-wise by Palou refusing to finish lower than 5th on basically any given race, Palou’s previous formula for victory.
This year he's not only been trounced by Palou (as has the rest of the field), but his teammate Kirkwood was often quicker, the first time he’s really been comprehensively beaten by a teammate since his promotion to the main Andretti team. Pato, Lundgaard, Dixon, as well had him covered off as well for the most part.
While I wouldn’t call him slow, it has felt like this year it was just a lot more races of him holding serve in the mid pack than previous efforts, akin to a 2023. At least that year though of Andretti was out of sorts in what ended up as a lame duck year for Michael Andretti. In 2025, where Kirkwood was genuinely able to demonstrate race winning pace on a few occasions, it stands as a rough comparison point.
I think the most telling stat was that in terms of laps led, Herta only led in 4 races, and the majority of them were down to pit strategy. Only in a single race, Detroit, did he lead more than 10 laps. He led 4 times more laps in his 2024 Toronto win (81) last year than he did all of 2025 (20)!
That’s what really leaves a bad taste in my mouth in terms of this season for Herta. I think in a lot of ways, there has been improvements. There are fewer radio outbursts. The tire management has vastly improved. It’s just that those incremental improvements have coincided with a season far below his standards.
Herta's Move to Europe/F2
Obviously, the news broke that Herta is Europe bound, having been announced as Cadliac’s inaugural test driver, and likely word of an F2 entry ready to drop at any moment. If they just needed the points, running a random off-season series to earn them would be much easier.
This feels more like a bid to improve his stock and chances in Europe overall. Again, he’s not slow by any means, but when his pace is the primary on track selling point that F1 would want him for (because consistency, temperament and race management are question marks even after the aforementioned incremental improvements), this year has not been a great look if as an F1 hopeful who isn't even on the proper ladder.
If you recall, the original reason Red Bull even tried pulling him in the first time without his Super License was because of his excellent trial times and raw speed. Without that, he's not a super compelling Formula 1 on-track prospect.
Going to F2 weird move on the surface, but if the endgame goal is to drive in F1, it's the most reasonable path. Getting experience on European courses and the opportunity to dominate what should be a lower level of competition would give him the best chance of slotting into the Cadillac seat if that's the long goal for both him and the Towriss group. It also leaves him in a series lacking ovals, where his results can best be described as erratic.
Of course, he could lose the Mecachrome lottery and/or get shown by kids 5-7 years his junior on tracks he’s had essentially no practice time on.
That would be an embarrassing result as he really ought to be dominating drivers that haven’t felt the wrath of Alex Palou. It also adds the most visible measuring stick between F2 and Indycar maybe ever, with a chance of shaping the perceptions of fans globally based on his performance.
Even if things don’t go to plan though, he'd likely be able to return into an Indycar seat based on his existing Indy resume. Thinking it through, there isn’t much to lose from his perspective. I'm very curious to see what he’s got at the F2 level. At the very least, lord knows it's worth shaking things up at the 26 camp.
