Courtesy INDY NXT BY FIRESTONE Communications (Photo Courtesy INDYCAR)
INDIANAPOLIS (Friday, Oct. 20, 2023) – If the Chris Griffis Memorial Test is any indication, there won’t be much room between the top drivers in INDY NXT by Firestone during the 2024 season.
Veteran Louis Foster was the quickest driver Friday in the all-day test on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, turning a top lap of 1 minute, 14.8432 seconds in the No. 26 Andretti Global car. British driver Foster finished fourth in the series standings as a rookie in 2023, with two victories.
“Hopefully, we can keep our form like last year into 2024,” Foster said. “Looking forward to the rest of the offseason and doing some more testing so we can improve on what we did today.”
Just .1728 of a second separated the top five drivers in the test on the 14-turn, 2.439-mile road course that incorporates parts of the iconic IMS oval.
Series veteran Jacob Abel was second at 1:14.9201 in the No. 51 Abel Motorsports machine. 2023 USF Pro 2000 champion Myles Rowe was the quickest of the newcomers, third overall at 1:14.9487 in the No. 99 HMD Motorsports car.
2023 INDY NXT by Firestone Rookie of the Year Nolan Siegel was fourth at 1:14.9918 in the No. 39 HMD Motorsports car. Brazilian rookie Caio Collet will be a driver to watch after he rounded out the top five at 1:15.0160 in the No. 18 HMD Motorsports machine. Collet has raced the last three seasons in the FIA Formula 3 Championship, with three victories.
Twenty-one drivers – two more than the full-time grid in 2023 for the growing INDYCAR development series – combined to turn 1,145 laps despite wet track conditions in the morning session. The only major incident occurred in the final 20 minutes of the day when Rowe went off track in Turn 12 and hit the tire barrier near the pit entrance. He was unhurt.
Today’s test is named in memory of Chris Griffis, the team manager of Schmidt Peterson Motorsports who passed away suddenly in September 2011.
The 2024 INDY NXT by Firestone season starts Sunday, March 10 on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida.
