Santino Ferrucci and Charlie Kimball have both found an NTT IndyCar Series ride for the 2020 season.
Ferrucci will continue at Dale Coyne Racing, but he will take over the SealMaster car, that was driven by Sebastien Bourdais during the 2019 campaign. This will be the second full season for the American in Indycar, where he has shown glimpes of excelence, but mixed up with quite a few rookie-mistakes. These errors need to be removed, if he wants any hope of finishing in the top 10 of the championship. Only 6 of the 17 races were finished in the top-10, and the rest were closer to 20th position rather than 10th.
Photo: Indycar.com / Shawn Gritzmacher
As announced one month ago, he will have Alex Palou as his teammate. It’s often been a rarity for Dale Coyne Racing to have both their drivers signed so early ahead of the season opener. But this will bring a bit of calmness to the team again, after they hit quite some troubled waters, after firing Sebastien Bourdais in November. Lucky for the Frenchman, he found a seat in sportscar racing, so he won’t be without a job.
Santino Ferrucci will be racing #18, as previously raced by Bourdais.
Charlie Kimball has signed with A. J. Foyt Enterprises, where he will be racing car #4. This will be the 10th season for Kimball, having raced full seasons bar 2019. He only managed to find funding for 6 races at Carlin in 2019, but has now found the full budget for 2020, making it possible for him to enter all 17 races. Novo Nordisk will once again be the key partner. The company and Kimball have strong ties due to his diabetes. They will be the primary sponsor at 6 of the race, while other “main-sponsors” will be present during the other 11 rounds. That’s not an unusual thing to do, with even the Penske drivers running multiple liveries during the season.
Photo: Indycar.com / Chris Jones
Kimball has a single Indycar win on his CV, but that’s all the way back from 2013 – and unless something really weird happens, he won’t add to that tally in 2020. The A. J. Foyt team has really struggled for the last few years. That has resulted in Matheus Leist no longer racing for the team, and Tony Kanaan being rumoured as doubtful to race for the team. Leist raced in #4 in both 2018 and 2019, but has grabbed a sportscar seat in the IMSA series.
The NTT IndyCar Series 2020 starts on 15. March in St. Petersburg, Florida.
