We’ve finally made it. The 2025 NTT IndyCar Series season is upon us with the green flag waving on Sunday (March 2) at the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg for the 27-car field. Only 13 of the full-time drivers for 2025 enter the season yet to win a race, just under half the field, but who truly has a chance at breaking the mold and gaining their first win?
Barring an astounding run or set of circumstances — which may very well happen — drivers with only the slightest chance at victory include Juncos Hollinger Racing’s Conor Daly and Sting Ray Robb as well as Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyffin Simpson.
The JHR teammates differ greatly from each other. Daly is a returning veteran of IndyCar, and while he is returning with a head of steam that includes a phenomenal podium at the first Milwaukee Mile race, Daly has his work cut out for him with a team that has yet to win an IndyCar race.
Entering his third year, Robb’s highlights of last season include leading 23 laps in the Indianapolis 500 and his first top-10 finish at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, finishing ninth. JHR had shown some speed at Indianapolis Motor Speedway during the Month of May last year, but if Robb doesn’t get any good pointers from Daly on the ovals, chances are slim he stands atop the podium this season.
Simpson is the only real non-contender who is with a powerhouse team. The Barbadian closed his rookie season with a best finish of 12th at the season opener at St. Petersburg but after that it was downhill. While it could help Simpson to be the third of three cars at CGR instead of the fifth of five cars this year, he doesn’t quite come across as a potential winner, yet.
Others who fall short of expectation include Devlin DeFrancesco, Louis Foster, Jacob Abel, Robert Shwartzman and Callum Ilott.
The 2024 season was dominated by the household names of the sport, as there were no first-time winners for the second time in three seasons, showing that the level of competition from other teams in the IndyCar garage needs to take a major step up this year. The last first-time winner was crowned at the Honda Indy Toronto in 2023 when Arrow McLaren’s newest driver, Christian Lundgaard, took his first win with Rahal Letterman Lannigan Racing.
So, after narrowing down the list of non-winners, who are the five that could potentially join Lundgaard as the 256th all-time winner in IndyCar?
Santino Ferrucci
Entering his third full-time season with A. J. Foyt Enterprises, Ferrucci has shown that the long-time outfit has the speed to compete at both ovals and road courses. His podium and run at the 2023 Indianapolis 500 is still remembered as well as being one of the few drivers who could pull off a green-flag pass on track at Iowa last year with his daring moves in the turns.
At Portland International Raceway, he earned his first pole in IndyCar as well as Foyt’s first pole as a team since 2014. Afterward, Ferrucci closed the season with two top fives, fourth at both Milwaukee races.
The first pole just hits different!
— NTT INDYCAR SERIES (@IndyCar) August 24, 2024
#INDYCAR // @SantinoFerrucci pic.twitter.com/OtE3ZUd5F0
To add to his eight top 10s (four to close 2024 out), Ferrucci looks poised to break through eventually and score Foyt their first win since Takuma Sato’s triumph at the 2013 Grand Prix of Long Beach.
Ferrucci will have to step up as the leader of the team because he now has a worthy competitor sharing the second Foyt seat. His pace in 2024 showed that, with the right set of circumstances, he can be a race winner.
David Malukas
Another talented driver on ovals is Malukas, who has paired with Ferrucci at Foyt and is the driver on this list who has come closest to victory with his second-place run at Gateway in 2022.
Last year at Gateway, Malukas looked poised to win had he not crashed with Will Power while battling for the lead in the late stages of the race. Up to that point, Malukas and Power were the class of the field.
The Chicagoan’s best finish of the season came at Toronto, finishing sixth. His only other top 10 was at the season finale with a ninth at Nashville Superspeedway.
Now with a new outfit, a new manufacturer and a full-time schedule, Malukas is once again looking at an opportunity to claim that coveted win and get the newly-branded No. 4 Chevrolet to victory lane.
Marcus Armstrong
The 2023 Rookie of the Year made strides with CGR in his first full-time season in 2024. He took his first podium in Detroit during a rain-effected race but, while he was able to score four top fives and seven top 10s, he didn’t put himself in position to win in the No. 11 Honda last season. Moving over to Meyer Shank Racing’s No. 66 Honda this season, Armstrong will be looking to make a jump with them for 2025, but that’s easier said than done.
Leaving one of the powerhouse teams in CGR could be felt heavily by the New Zealander down the line as he will only have the veteran guidance of Felix Rosenqvist to lean on going into his new driver-team relationship. Still, with the speed he showed at different tracks across the season there’s no reason to count out Armstrong as someone who can make the breakthrough this season, especially with the pace Rosenqvist showed in his early outings with MSR last year.
Nolan Siegel
After bouncing around from team to team early last season with Dale Coyne Racing and JHR, 20-year-old Siegel will have one team to call for his first full-time season. While Siegal has only made 12 starts in IndyCar so far, he is with one of the four teams who were able to score a win this season. Having winners like Pato O’Ward and new addition Lundgaard as teammates should help Siegal develop his skills this season.
Siegal’s ceiling for 2025 could potentially be a win with the papaya squad. His only top 10 of 2024 came on the flat oval at Gateway, and we have yet to see how he will perform in good equipment at the early tracks, setting Siegal up as potentially the biggest wild card driver for this season.
Christian Rasmussen
After a part-time schedule with Ed Carpenter Racing last season, Rasmussen gets the call-up to pilot the No. 21 Chevrolet for the newly rebranded team.
The Dane ran 15 of the 17 races in his part-time rookie season in the No. 20 and No. 33 Chevrolets, finishing in the top 10 once at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.
With only having a limited amount of experience, why is Rasmussen one of the top five contenders to win this season? The answer is Alexander Rossi.
Rossi will seek to bring much needed reform to the team after the departure of long-time driver Rinus VeeKay to DCR. With his eight career wins, including the 2016 Indianapolis 500, Rossi could bring a winning mentality to a team which hasn’t found victory lane since VeeKay’s lone Indy road course win in 2021. If Rossi’s influence proves beneficial for the whole team and Rasmussen continues his own development at a solid pace, the Dane could be in position to rise to new heights along with his journeyman team.
Wyatt Watson has followed NASCAR closely since 2007. He joined Frontstretchas a journalist in February 2023 after serving in the United States Navy for five years as an Electronic Technician Navigation working on submarines. Wyatt writes breaking NASCAR news and contributes to columns such as Friday Faceoff and 2-Headed Monster. Wyatt also contributes to Frontstretch's social media and serves as an at-track reporter, collecting exclusive content for Frontstretch.
Wyatt Watson can be found on Twitter @WyattGametime