Catch up on the latest IndyCar news in just five minutes! Highlights include the Rolex 24 results where current IndyCar drivers faced tough luck, with Will Power finishing second. Media day revealed some intriguing developments, including Dale Coyne's single driver attendance fueling speculation about his second seat. Legal troubles for Alex Palou continue with a $12 million judgment against him. The episode also discusses predictions for the 2026 season and rookie performances in Indy NXT testing, setting the stage for an exciting year ahead.
"Today is January 30th, 2026 and last weekend was the Rolex 24. 10 current IndyCar drivers were in that race, but none of them has a new watch."
The Rolex 24 is a famous car race that lasts for 24 hours. Teams of drivers take turns racing their cars, and it's known for being very challenging and exciting.
The Rolex 24 is a prestigious endurance race held annually at Daytona International Speedway, featuring teams of drivers competing over a 24-hour period. It is part of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and attracts a mix of professional and amateur racers.
"A past IndyCar driver, Toby Sowery, who briefly raced IndyCar with Dale Coyne, did win an LMP2. So Toby Sowery knows what time it is."
LMP2 is a type of race car used in endurance racing. These cars are built to be very fast and are often seen in long races like the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
LMP2 stands for Le Mans Prototype 2, a class of sports car racing that is designed for endurance racing, particularly in events like the 24 Hours of Le Mans. These cars are faster than GT cars but slower than the top-tier LMP1 cars.
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Hi, I'm IndyCarDad and this is a week's worth of IndyCar news in 5 minutes.
Today is January 30th, 2026 and last weekend was the Rolex 24.
10 current IndyCar drivers were in that race, but none of them has a new watch.
The Rolex 24 is a team race and our guys just didn't get lucky with the teams they
chose.
No one's sequel did end up on the podium in his class and Will Power ended up in second
place, but no wins for current IndyCar drivers.
A past IndyCar driver, Toby Sowery, who briefly raced IndyCar with Dale Coyne, did win an LMP2.
So Toby Sowery knows what time it is.
This week was IndyCar media day, or media day, it's two days.
All of the drivers report to shoot little promo videos for the series, take pictures, do tiktok-y
tasks for race promoters and industry partners, so there's going to be a lot of cute videos
that come out of industry media day, but we also learned a few things.
Here's something, Dale Coyne only showed up with one driver, so this would have been a
great time for him to introduce who's going to be in the second seat, but it just adds
fuel to the rumor that that seat hasn't been confirmed yet.
And then Prema's team didn't show up at all, so they didn't even get their two drivers
to media day.
It's a bad sign, really.
I don't think it's a particularly expensive thing to show up to, so the fact that they
didn't spring to have the drivers there is not a good sign.
Next thing, Alex Palo's lawsuit from not honoring the contracts he made with McLaren Racing
has the judge concluded the damages that he owes to McLaren, and that's $12 million.
There's also a possibility McLaren can sue for their legal fees, which will probably
happen as well, and supposedly that bill is quite high.
Another interesting thing that happened this week, Tim Sindrich, if you've heard the name
before, it's because he was Roger Penske's right-hand man at Penske Racing.
He's also the father of Austin Sindrich, the NASCAR driver, and he is also one of the dudes
that was fired when Penske Racing got caught cheating again last year.
As part of that scandal, he got the ax.
Well, guess what?
It's just announced that he's back, and he's going to be the race strategist for Scott
McLaughlin.
Now, Tim Sindrich is an excellent race strategist, but it's also a sign that Penske Racing wants
to win.
It's also, there is this new independent stewarding body for IndyCar, so now that Penske
got to remove themselves one step from the governing of IndyCar racing, they brought
back Tim Sindrich.
So interesting stuff.
Not so interesting.
Donald Trump posted an AI video of a possible Washington, DC Grand Prix.
That's all there is to it.
I don't think there's too much talk behind that, but it was an interesting video.
Pat O'Award got his commercial for this year, so he got his 2026 Fox promo in the commercial.
He drives a garbage truck around a neighborhood at a crazy speed, and he winks at women and
just acts cute.
It's cute.
You'll see it, I hope, if you watch some football or anything like that.
Or just during our races, I think you'll see Pat O's commercial, and it's pretty good.
Redditors made predictions for the 2026 season, which I love predictions.
So predicted champions include, of course, Alex Palau, but maybe this year he'll have
some difficulty.
Pat O, Felix Rosenquist, Scott McLaughlin, New Garden, Kirkwood, and those ones.
So that's the favorites of the Redditors.
Also they predicted 500 winners.
Joseph New Garden was the top prediction there, followed by Pat O, Centino Ferrucci, Scott
Dixon, Lucas, Will Power, Felix Rosenquist, Kyle Kirkwood, Renas Vique, someone even predicted
Mick Schumacher, and someone even predicted Connor Daly will win the 500 this year.
So lots of fun predictions over on Reddit.
Another thing that happened is there had been this rumor floating around that teams were
thinking about buying out Prema, and one of those teams was supposedly Dryer and Rimbold.
Dryer and Rimbold Racing has said that they want to go race some more races, and so people
were thinking, oh, maybe they'll buy Prema.
But Marshall Pruitt published something that said Dryer and Rimbold Racing has more than
enough equipment to run a full season.
They don't need to buy Prema stuff, so that was interesting.
Another strike for Prema, it's a bad week for Prema, is that Ryan Briscoe, who Prema had hired
to be driver coach, and he especially on the Old Vols, but for IndyCar Racing in general,
for Robert Schwarzman.
Ryan Briscoe, I think was a really strong access to Prema.
Look at how they got the poll at the Indy 500, but Ryan Briscoe is going to ROL to help make
Schumacher this year, so another strike against Prema.
Finally, I'll talk about Indy NXT.
So Indy NXT had two test days this week at Sebring, and in day one Max Taylor and Max Garcia
topped the charts.
In day two, Enzo Fittipaldi was fastest.
Max Taylor was up there, and Alessandro DiTulio was up there too.
So the interesting thing about these names is that these are all rookies.
Typically, Indy NXT in the past has been a great series for drivers in their second year,
so we would have expected like Locky Hughes to do really well, or Miles Rose in his third year
to do really well, but actually it was five rookies that topped the charts.
So I think we're in for a really great season of Indy NXT.
Again, this has been this week's IndyCar News in five minutes.
I'm IndyCar Dad.
Thanks for watching on your favorite podcast platform.
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