Santino Ferrucci has only one podium finish in more than 60 NTT IndyCar Series starts, and the 25-year-old from Woodbury, Conn., has yet to record a top-10 finish in the series standings.
Expect considerable improvement in both categories this season as it appears Ferrucci is just getting started.
His IndyCar adventure began with Dale Coyne Racing in 2018. Top-10 finishes in the 2019 and ’20 Indianapolis 500s were the highlights before he was out on the curb at 22 years old.
While most would think pursuing a full-time IndyCar ride was his natural approach, Ferrucci had other plans.
A seven-race deal with Sam Hunt Racing in the NASCAR Xfinity Series presented the driver with a unique opportunity.
“It was getting tough. I had found some sponsorship that wanted to be on the NASCAR side of things that I’d had and I just never thought to pursue it,” Ferrucci told SPEED SPORT. “Since I had all the downtime, I needed to stay relevant.
“Me driving in an Indy car really wasn’t going to prove much at that point in my career.”
Ferrucci flashed with six top-10 results and posted an average finish of 12.8 during his rookie year (2019) in IndyCar.
“I knew that I had a hell of a rookie season,” Ferrucci said. “I think I was 13th in the championship.”
Ferrucci believed his résumé spoke for itself.
“If people weren’t going to see that moving forward, I didn’t see the point in really trying to push the issue,” he recalled. “I knew I was going to end up with a 500 ride just because I had my seventh and fourth.
“I wanted to pursue something that I thought would make more sense. Xfinity, running the most difficult tracks. So, all the mile-and-a-half driver tracks, and doing well there, I think really showed that I can kind of do a little bit of everything.”
Four of his seven Xfinity Series starts resulted in top-15 finishes, including a best finish of 13th at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Ferrucci doubled down on his proposal to potential employers in a one-off at the Indy 500.
“Back into Indy, finished sixth again, so (that) started to open things up,” Ferrucci said.
Following his Indy 500 run with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, Ferrucci made four more starts for the team, finishing 11th or better each time.
Ferrucci felt he made his case for a full-time ride in 2022, however, it never came.
His future with the series looked bleak until the performance of a lifetime in a last-minute effort at Texas Motor Speedway.
With RLL’s full-time driver Jack Harvey sidelined due to a crash during practice earlier in the weekend, Ferrucci started from the rear of the field (27th) and finished ninth.
“I don’t think anyone’s ever showed up and just hopped in a car starting last at a speedway and drove into the top 10,” Ferrucci said. “It’s stuff like that to where it just really showcases my raw ability to just jump in and go. But, dude, I was having so much fun. It’s tough to fill-in for drivers that are injured. It’s part of the sport. I get that.
“But it gives someone like me a hell of a way to showcase opportunity. I’ve performed in all those occasions.”
His performance at Texas and another top-10 effort in the Indy 500 that year were stepping-stones to what was to come.
Ferrucci inked a deal with A.J. Foyt Racing to wheel the famed No. 14 Indy car in 2023. He became the latest addition to an organization that had used 16 drivers since its most recent victory with Takuma Sato in 2013.
There were plenty of growing pains for Ferrucci and the Foyt team.
“It was quite interesting. We had a lot of good races that we would have been able to string together, but it was always one thing or another,” Ferrucci explained. “We had a couple of races where we just absolutely couldn’t figure out the car balance, like Nashville, Iowa, Toronto.
“Anywhere it was incredibly bumpy, we really struggled to understand what was happening on the dampers side of things with the setup, because you can clearly tell there was something wrong.”
Even when the series would visit smoother race tracks, the issues continued for Ferrucci and the No. 14 team.
“Then we’d figured out some of the smooth tracks, but then we’d have some issues with electronics or pit stops,” Ferrucci said. “I mean, we didn’t qualify three times last season, due to an electrical failure or something that was just completely out of our control.”
However, the month of May lifted the team to a high A.J. Foyt Racing hadn’t experienced in more than a decade. Ferrucci stunned onlookers with a fourth-place qualifying effort. He wasn’t done there.
Ferrucci ran near the front for the entirety of the 107th edition of the Indianapolis 500.
Mixing it up with eventual race winner Josef Newgarden and runner-up Marcus Ericsson, Ferrucci’s strong run ended in third place.
It was his best finish in The Greatest Spectacle in Racing, and it was a huge boost to his confidence.
“Obviously, confidence is a big one. For me as a driver, it’s a massive feat,” Ferrucci said. “I now have five top 10s with four different teams. So, slowly starting to prove that getting around that track isn’t just the car.
“It is still a driver’s track, as much as people want to think you hold it wide open and turn left. I think that’s a big deal.”
The last time an A.J. Foyt Racing machine finished that well at Indianapolis was Eliseo Salazar (third), 24 years ago.
“Then for the team, they’ve particularly struggled there in the past years,” Ferrucci noted. “To match their best in over two decades and then fight for the win all day long was, I think, really good.
“It was also really good for our sponsor Homes for Troops. We raised a ton of money for charity, over three-million bucks. So we built at least three houses for our vets. I think rolling that momentum into this year is a big deal.
“Everybody’s super excited again. I’m just ready to get back to the track and have a little bit more fun.”
While Ferrucci is anxious to return to Indy, he’s still focused on improving during the full season ahead.
A solid 11th-place effort in the season-opening Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg was a strong start to the year for Ferrucci. One reason for the improvement may be A.J. Foyt Racing’s new technical alliance.
Entering this year, Team Penske, which holds a stellar 17 IndyCar championships and 19 Indy 500 victories, has a partnership with A.J. Foyt Racing. According to Ferrucci, it’s a monumental move for the Foyt team.
“The way that we build the cars, the way that we double check things, how we organize our mechanics into procedures, checklists,” Ferrucci said. “For the driving side, we have the help of some data that we get supplied to us throughout the weekends.
“We have some setup knowledge from them as well, damper help. When we roll out our packages, overall, much better. So we have a much better starting point. Then, it’s up to us on the race weekends to try and adapt it to my driving style.”
With the addition of the Penske data, Ferrucci’s bid for an Indy 500 victory should be considered legitimate.
In fact, the same car he scored a podium finish with last May is all ready to eclipse 220 mph once again.
“We finished May and pulled that car off the rig and it got unwrapped, and it sat in the team workshop in Indy up until this winter and it’s just been getting loved on and worked on since then,” Ferrucci beamed. “It’ll be back out there this May.”
Ferrucci’s path hasn’t been easy and there have been plenty of lessons along the way.
“I came into the series, I was 19. I’m 25 now, married,” Ferrucci laughed. “Definitely life has changed quite a bit for me. The way that you work with the team, your thought process and the way you go through race weekends.
“Throughout the years, it gets a lot easier and everything makes a lot more sense,” he continued. “You can think a lot more critically and give feedback a lot more accurately, and in a much calmer, easier way. Just giving it to the engineers, it’s important to not be flustered and frustrated. “We had a lot of that last year, so I definitely learned that I had a lot of patience, a lot more than I ever thought I had.”
THIS ARTICLE IS REPOSTED FROM THE APRIL 24th EDITION OF SPEED SPORT INSIDER
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