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Motorsport

Sport

The winners and losers of 2025’s IndyCar season opener at St. Pete

St Petersburg IndyCar Scott Dixon Fox Penske Entertainment Fox Sports Alex Palou Colton Herta Pato OWard Patricio OWard

More than five months removed from the 2024 season finale in Nashville, the NTT IndyCar Series finally returned to life in St. Petersburg, Florida. Between the start of a new era with FOX Sports and a strategy-heavy street race, there was much to discuss leaving the weekend.

Some IndyCar names landed on the positive side of things, positioning themselves for future success. Others were left with early holes to dig out of after an early crash and pit road woes.

Here’s a look at the winners and losers leaving the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.

Scott Dixon, Chip Ganassi Racing (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Loser: Scott Dixon

Leave it to the Iceman to have to figure out his own strategy and still nearly win. Dixon ran the bulk of Sunday’s race without any radio, leaving him checking his fuel gauge and “kinda just flying blind” on when to stop. He was on the winning strategy and ahead of Palou, but missed a call to pit and lost time stuck behind lapped traffic. That opened the door for a Palou undercut that kept Dixon from an elusive first St. Pete win.

Josef Newgarden, Team Penske (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Winner: Former champs put themselves in contention

Any new fans tuning in for their first IndyCar race on FOX were treated to some of the sport’s best drivers up front. The podium finishers - Alex Palou, Josef Newgarden and Scott Dixon - combine for 11 series titles and 101 race wins. With strong runs in the opening race, they’ve each positioned themselves to be championship contenders once again. No surprises here.

Scott McLaughlin, Team Penske (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Loser: Scotty Mac’s day undone by untimely yellow

Scott McLaughlin did everything right to put himself in position for a second St. Pete win. The New Zealand ace qualified on pole, got through the opening corners clean and ran with strong pace throughout the day. Unfortunately for him, sometimes luck and strategy are key to wins in IndyCar. He started on the harder primary tire, which meant he couldn’t pit and be done with the quick-shredding soft tires after a lap 1 crash. McLaughlin did what he could to close the gap on those that could, but wound up fourth at race’s end.

Patricio O'ward, Arrow McLaren (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Loser: Herta and O’Ward suffer in St. Pete

Pato O'Ward and Colton Herta have each won in St. Pete in the past five years, but their weekends didn’t go to plan in the track’s 2025 race. O’Ward qualified a distant 23rd, got pushed off-strategy with a lap 1 puncture and had to rally to salvage an 11th-place finish. Herta started strong but was derailed by pit road issues, relegating him to 16th. In a series where consistency is paramount, Arrow McLaren’s star driver will have a razor-thin margin for error moving forward.

Felix Rosenqvist, Meyer Shank Racing (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Winner: FOX brings the pomp for IndyCar opener

FOX Sports played its cards right in the weeks leading up to its first IndyCar broadcast. It nailed its early advertisements - showcasing three stars, bringing in NFL legend Tom Brady for crossover appeal and airing ads during the Super Bowl. The company brought in recognizable faces for its broadcast team, including fan-favorite Formula 1 presenter Will Buxton.

Hype was sufficiently built. All it had to do this weekend was stick the landing. And thankfully, FOX largely pulled it off. There was room for improvement - the driver intros have a strange cadence, more data could be provided and the producers went to the wrong car a few times on replays. But the company largely presented IndyCar with reverence, intelligence and respect. Something to build on.

That said…

Loser: FOX Sports sticks with the superhero theme

Football. NASCAR. IndyCar. It doesn’t matter the sport or series. These superhero headshots look awful.

The Conor Daly FOX super hero headshot cracks me up for whatever reason. pic.twitter.com/z97EaYXpua
— Nick Yeoman (@NYeoman) March 1, 2025

Rinus Veekay, Dale Coyne Racing (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Winner: Veekay, Rossi find success at new homes

Rinus VeeKay had a quiet opening weekend in St. Pete, but ended it with a strong ninth-place run for Dale Coyne Racing. One of the drivers that went to his old home, Ed Carpenter Racing, also found modest success. Alexander Rossi came home a solid 10th in his first race with the No. 20 team. Something to build on.

Will Power, Team Penske (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Loser: Power, Siegel and Foster crash out early

Will Power came into St. Pete celebrating his 44th birthday. He left after two hybrid unit changes, one of his worst qualifying performances at the track and a crash just seconds into the race.

Power nudged into a checked-up Nolan Siegel as the field rolled through the opening corners, setting off a crash that also eliminated rookie Louis Foster. The end result? Finishes of 25th, 26th and 27th.

This trio waited months for IndyCar to get back to action. They’ll have to hold on for another three weeks to (hopefully) race at The Thermal Club.

Winner: Chip Ganassi Racing scores a big AI partner

It’s rare for a partnership to catch your eye in modern motorsports, when liveries change by the week and teams are constantly hunting for the next partner. But Chip Ganassi Racing made waves with its “strategic research collaboration” with artificial intelligence frontrunner OpenAI, announced Friday. The team says it will “create advanced efficiency as they can help automate knowledge-based tasks in ways that were previously impossible or at least time-consuming.”

Love it or hate it (as a writer, it doesn’t bode well for me), AI systems continue to improve and will have use cases in every industry. It was only a matter of time before an IndyCar team partnered with one of these companies. Now we wait to see how long it takes before Google Gemini, Amazon Alexa or Claude by Anthropic make their way into the paddock.