Written by Dan Jones, Edited by Morgan Holiday
After a 2024 season underlined by personnel changes, unsatisfactory results and frustration, Arrow McLaren head into 2025 with a new driver, a new Team Principal and a new outlook in their continual quest to join Chip Ganassi Racing and Team Penske as the operations fighting for IndyCar championships on a regular basis.
With Pato O'Ward entering his sixth season with the team, Nolan Siegel entering his first full season with the team and Christian Lundgaard making the move from Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, the team with an average age of just 23 will look to finally lead McLaren toward those championships.
Here's what all three drivers had to say on IndyCar's content days.
How is Lundgaard adapting to life at McLaren?
Lundgaard's move to Arrow McLaren felt like a driver transfer that was waiting to happen for several seasons at an essential time of Lundgaard's career. The Dane's development was clearly being hindered by the performance of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, and he needed to move before his stock value declined in the driver market.
It'll be the first time in Lundgaard's IndyCar career that he will not be in RLL machinery, debuting with the team in a one-off race in 2021 before three full seasons with the Indianapolis-based outfit. It would be understandable if Lundgaard would take some time to embed into a new team under those circumstances, but so far, so good for Lundgaard:
"The transition with everybody has been very, very smooth. A lot of familiar faces, a lot of new faces, as well, and I think really that's the challenge. It's the first time in my career that I drive for a different team in the same series. That's the only thing that really takes some getting used to."
Lundgaard will have the task at Arrow McLaren of trying to reach the pace of his teammate, Pato O'Ward, something previous McLaren signings like Felix Rosenqvist and Alexander Rossi were unable to do on a regular basis. Their inability to match O'Ward ultimately meant they would move to pursue their own direction in the series.
Lundgaard heads into the No.7 McLaren occupied by Rossi last season, where the Californian finished 10th in the standings. Rossi's performances may be the initial benchmark, but from Lundgaard's perspective his performances will be based on more factors than meet the eye:
"Well, ultimately I can always use Alex as a reference in that sense, and I can use myself in a different car. Obviously I can use the experience that I have from one car, but bringing it into another, it's a different philosophy depending on the track, even all tracks might be a different driving style than what I'm used to, and obviously that's the adaptation that I need to be able to handle.
"I guess we'll see, but I've taken all the information that I've been provided to me, and obviously what I don't necessarily need, I can always throw away. But it's about learning as much and having the information and then taking use of it."
After Gavin Ward was removed as Team Principal in the off-season, Arrow McLaren went through several leadership changes, most notably, 2013 Indianapolis 500 winner Tony Kanaan stepping into Ward's previous role. It's unusual to have a former driver as the individual in such a role. However, Kanaan has clearly had a major influence in the team ever since he joined the team in his Sporting Director role in 2023. Being a driver who has raced in 296 IndyCar races, Kanaan's expertise is valuable as noted by Lundgaard when asked by DIVEBOMB:
"I've spoken a lot to Tony about a lot of different topics. Obviously ovals being one of them. He's been a mentor from an outside standpoint of view, as well, to other people, kind of covering, as well, because he's been in the position where he's won a 500, been in a not-so-good car and knows what it's like driving a car that doesn't necessarily handle the way we want or is purely fast enough.
"He's been a big part of, one, giving me this opportunity, as well, but also understanding and kind of telling people, hey, wait and see until he's in this car."
As has been the case his entire IndyCar career, it's rather difficult to assess where Lundgaard will be performance-wise early on in the season. There will be a lot of learning to do coming into a new team, but from the flashes of brilliance that he has shown in his career so far, there is an expectation that Lundgaard can finally present somewhat of a challenge to O'Ward - something none of the Mexican's teammates have been able to do to date.
How does O'Ward think McLaren can turn 2025 around?
O'Ward was the only McLaren driver to compete in all 17 races in 2024, and the only full-time driver to continue racing for the team in 2025. It was a mixed year for McLaren and O'Ward, and one quite difficult to put into words.
After missing victory lane for the entirety of 2023, O'Ward bounced back with victories in St. Petersburg, Mid-Ohio and Milwaukee - the first time the team took three victories in a season since the McLaren name returned to IndyCar in 2020. However, O'Ward still had seven finishes outside the top ten, and the least amount of top fives in a season since he joined the team.
How does O'Ward summarise 2024? "Inconsistent. I would say performance-wise, good days were great, bad days were horrible. It just seems to be the name of the game for us the last few years because I just don't think we're at the level where we need to be yet in terms of reliability. I've still made my fair share of mistakes.
"There hasn't been one thing that it's like, hey, let's just fix that, and it's not simple because you go to these places and you're so on the edge because if you're not on the edge you're 20th. Those joker cards, you will have to use them once or twice during the year, but you try and minimize that.
"We've had too many of those instances where we're just throwing away points really. Cleaning that up and making our bad days better will have a significant impact in how we're looking at the end of the season really."
After the departure of Rossi, O'Ward heads a particularly young Arrow McLaren line-up, being the senior at 25 with five-and-a-half seasons of IndyCar experience. It's a role O'Ward hasn't necessarily had to fulfil before. After he started his first full-time season with rookie Oliver Askew in 2020 he had the more experienced Rosenqvist and Rossi as teammates in subsequent years.
"I would say I don't feel like the senior of the team," O'Ward commented. "But it's a different role, I would say, because I've always had guys with quite a lot more experience than me. But it's called moving with time. That happens. I'm 25. I'm going to turn 26 this year. That's just something that I'm going to have to accept as time goes on.
"But that just means you've got more knowledge in your memory bank that you can go back on and use to your advantage whenever you need it during the championship and during the season.
"But yeah, I think we're going to have a good thing going, and it's all about just working well because I've worked really well with all my past teammates, so my focus is just making sure that we can all kind of find what each of us likes in a way but also find where we can all kind of come together and create a package that is going to be strong, especially at these big events like the 500 and stuff like that. We need that."
O'Ward has been at the team ever since they returned to the sport. He claimed the team's first win in 2021, and was a key title contender that year, ultimately falling short to Álex Palou in the season finale at Long Beach after a controversial collision with Ed Jones.
Since then, McLaren have not been performing at the standards they expect. They have claimed five victories across three years, exclusively in the No.5 car, and O'Ward has not been a championship figure in the crunch time of the season. A lot of changes have been made to the drivers and the leadership structure of the team, but all to little avail. The race-to-race inconsistency of the team is a major factor in why results aren't coming, which O'Ward expanded on:
"A season will always have its challenges. It's never going to be perfect. It's not going to be how you always want it to be. But you have to be as close to perfect as you can if you want to be a champion. You have to be close to perfect in an Indy 500 in order to win that race. All it takes is just make sure that you're well-prepared for the challenges that are coming ahead, because if you go into it being, I just want a chill season, that's probably going to be a boring and slow season for you.
"When you're fighting at the top, there's always going to be drama. There's always going to be different highs and lows of emotions because that's ultimately what makes it so special and entertaining for other people, as well. I just think we need to be ready for that, and taking a page out of Andrea [Stella]'s book, when you think about it, I think it's such a privilege to be in such a high-pressure situation because that means you're doing something well, and that's what we're going to try and do."
The lack of consistency within the team could also be partially down to regular challenges in setup from car-to-car. As O'Ward noted: "I've always been on my own island. Everybody whines about how I like my car. I've always kind of been a loner in terms of where I like my things."
Both Rossi and Rosenqvist had a much calmer driving style to O'Ward, who is renowned for his 'fast hands' in the cockpit and his 'sawing' at the wheel when he races. However, heading into 2025, both Lundgaard and Siegel pose a new driving style for the team, and O'Ward is keen to learn from them too:
"I'm an open book. Just seeing how everything kind of usually falls in IndyCar, he'll [Lundgaard] probably have his own kind of direction, and what's most important is just making sure that all three cars are fast because a lot of times we're each in kind of our own island and we all have the same issue, and you know there's a fundamental thing there rather than actual setup."
If McLaren are going to become the perennial title contenders that the leadership team expect them to be, results must start coming, and these inconsistencies must be minimised. With a new driver line-up and new leadership at the team, it feels like there's nowhere for McLaren to hide, and nobody who can be scapegoated for not meeting the expectations.
What does Siegel expect from a first full IndyCar season?
Nolan Siegel's move to Arrow McLaren last year was another stunning turn of events surrounding the No.6 car. The young Californian become the fourth driver contracted to the seat in less than six months after he controversially replaced Théo Pourchaire.
Siegel had started 2024 on a part-time program with Dale Coyne Racing, aiming to keep his rookie status coming into 2025, but stated exclusively to DIVEBOMB last year: "I was definitely not going to turn down an offer to run with Arrow McLaren this year to keep my rookie status for next year."
Siegel also stated in that exclusive interview that: “The background goal that we’re always thinking about is coming out as strong as we can St. Pete 2025. For the rest of the season, it would be really nice to have some good results."
DIVEBOMB followed up on this question with Siegel about what he's expecting from 2025: "Yeah, I was thrown into the deep end for sure, but I think that those challenging weekends and moments are when you learn the most. I feel like I am in a much better position going into 2025 than I would have been having not done those races, and I feel like myself and the whole team has used this off-season very productively, and I feel like we're in a really good spot going into 2025.
The goal is to go into St. Pete feeling like there was nothing more we could have done to prepare, and I feel like we've been doing that so far."
The preparation heading into 2025 has been quite significant both inside and outside the car, with Siegel paying a particular mind to the physical work that he's done this season behind the scenes: "I've gained like 15 pounds, I don't think it was an issue last year, but I feel like I'm in a better spot physically now to drive the INDYCAR than I was last year."
As mentioned by Siegel, he joined the team in a very busy period of the schedule last summer, and did not have time to sufficiently adapt to the nature of full-time IndyCar racing. He would finish 2024 23rd in the standings with a best finish of seventh, after missing four races during the entire 2024 season.
However, an extensive off-season has given the Siegel the chance to learn the smaller intricacies that he did not have the chance to do in 2024.
"We've reviewed at this point almost every race of the season from a strategy standpoint, just to help me better understand IndyCar strategy and the IndyCar rules. I think it was a challenge last year for me to be thinking about strategy in the car just because I didn't have the experience and didn't know what different scenarios really meant for our race.
"I think I'll have a much better understanding of that and be able to be more involved in the strategy while I'm driving a race car. We don't have very much testing so it's hard to really work on driving-specific things, but there's so much more to it than that."
Siegel also comes into 2025 with a new race engineer, Kate Gundlach, who was promoted to the role after working on the No.5 car in previous years. It's an interesting dynamic of a new engineer and a young driver, but Siegel has a positive outlook on their fresh relationship:
"I've really enjoyed working with Kate. She is new to the race engineer role. She is by no means new to INDYCAR. She has a lot of experience and has been doing a phenomenal job so far. Really excited about working with her, and I've spent quite a bit of time with her now, and we get along really well. I think that makes a big difference.
Looking forward to it.
"Yes, I think while on the surface you look at new driver, new engineer, how is that going to go, I think in a lot of ways a new perspective can be a good thing, and there are a lot of engineers that have been around for a long time and have a lot of experience and knowledge. Sometimes it's nice to have someone that's open to experimenting and open to trying to do things a little bit differently.
I think we're going to find quite a bit of speed and have a good time doing it."
As noted by McLaren, Siegel's main improvement will need to come in the form of qualifying. Across the 13 championship races that Siegel competed in, the 20-year-old qualified an average of 21st, with a best performance of 11th twice. McLaren's two full-time drivers qualified 9th and 11th on average last year.
But what does Siegel expect from 2025? It's quite clear he expects his performance to be strong: "The goal is to be on the podium and win races. It's super competitive. It's an incredibly competitive race series, and it's by no means easy and every weekend isn't going to be smooth, but I think if we capitalize on the weekends where we have a strong race car and we're in the positions that we want to be in, we're going to have chances to be up front and be celebrating on Sundays."
It's going to be a very important year for Siegel. After his shock signing for the team last year, he must prove to the doubters on why McLaren dropped Pourchaire mid-season to pick up the highly-rated hotshot Siegel. Last year wasn't representative of what he can do, but with a lot of work done over the off-season, 2025 will be Siegel's opportunity to prove himself.
Is Lundgaard ready to fight at the front on ovals?
It's been no secret that Lundgaard's former employers in Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing have had a pretty torrid time on ovals ever since the Dane joined the team full-time in 2022. With no top five finish on an oval since that time, the team's package has been unable to give Lundgaard a true chance to show his potential on ovals.
One of the biggest question marks about Lundgaard's move to McLaren is how he will perform on these oval tracks. In the same timeframe, O'Ward has taken 11 top five's in oval races, and the team have always been a force at the Indianapolis 500. With Lundgaard completely unable to fight at the front on ovals in his career to date, his oval ability remains a big unknown, and he will need to show at McLaren that he is a capable oval driver.
"Of course it is a question," Lundgaard commented about the oval expectation when asked by DIVEBOMB. "But I think it's now a time where I can prove that. I think ultimately it's we'll see whenever we get to May, but I'm very optimistic. I have high hopes myself."
His first chance to showcase his oval capabilities will be at the Indianapolis 500, where O'Ward finished runner-up last season, and McLaren had two cars in the Fast Six. In Lundgaard's three runs at the Speedway, he has never qualified higher than 28th (with a best finish of 13th).
You'd think that Lundgaard would feel like he has plenty to learn at the Indianapolis 500, particularly competing at the front of the field. But the 23-year-old feels like he's already learned the hardest task:
"Having done this for three years, having been in the race, fortunately/unfortunately I've had the pleasure of coming from the back.
"In a way, I take that as a positive now because I've learned to race from the back with the most turbulent air. Obviously I don't necessarily have the benefit of the more clean air, but I think from a race craft standpoint, I feel very confident in that. The one thing I do believe is at the end of the day, the cars feel very similar but yet very different, but I think for me, it's more the car has a lot more pure pace than what I've had previously."
This comment is a fascinating outlook on Lundgaard's confidence heading into May, where McLaren have been notoriously strong for several seasons. Lundgaard's ability to race through the pack is noticeable, having a net gain of 39 positions at the '500' in comparison to where he started each year.
2025 presents a real chance for Lundgaard to shine at the Speedway: "I'm excited to kind of feel more competitive. I did that at the 500 in 2024 when we came from the back. We were leading at some point -- yes, we were on a different strategy, but at least you didn't really feel hopeless or helpless for that matter, and it's a lot more fun that way."
Ovals are the biggest unknown about Lundgaard's move and now he's got nowhere to hide in his personal oval capabilities. The 'Month of May' is always a slightly unrepresentative metric of oval performance, but when the show hits it's oval swing towards seasons-end, Lundgaard will have to show that he is at the standard McLaren expects.
Will there be F1 opportunities for Siegel and Lundgaard?
McLaren's international motorsport presence offers something no other IndyCar team can provide - an opportunity to drive an F1 car.
After O'Ward claimed his maiden IndyCar victory at Texas Motor Speedway in 2021, a bet with McLaren CEO Zak Brown meant that O'Ward tested a current F1 car for the first time at the end-of-season young driver's test.
Opportunities since have only expanded for O'Ward, having free practice sessions in Abu Dhabi in both 2022 and 2023, as well in his native Mexico City last year, and running in all three season's young driver's test. 2024 also saw O'Ward become the team's official reserve driver, a role he is set to continue once the IndyCar season ends in August.
Lundgaard has previously been in-and-around the F1 scene, unlike Siegel, being a part of Renault's Young Driver Programme between 2017 and 2021 which included testing several F1 cars.
When asked if F1 was something he wanted to pursue with McLaren, Lundgaard's answer was clear: "No. I've been a part of that, and in my opinion it's passed. IndyCar is where I want to be. Obviously I'll never say no in the sense that it's not a possibility, but it's certainly not where my intentions are. It's here in IndyCar."
Siegel, however, has only spent his career in the Road to Indy ladder. F1 has been a far-fetched dream for him, unlike for O'Ward and Lundgaard, who both had been knocking on the F1 door prior to their IndyCar moves. Siegel is also four years younger than Lundgaard, and has a very different outlook:
"I would love to race in Formula 1. The goal right now is, again, to be a championship contender in IndyCar. That is the main focus at the moment. If I had the opportunity to do a Formula 1 test or have reserve position or something like that, I would absolutely be open to it, but my focus and goal is not to move to Formula 1.
"Yes, I would love to do it, but there's no focus being put on that. It's all on IndyCar at the moment."
That notes two very different perspectives from two drivers still relatively new to the team. But as mentioned by both, the priority must remain on the series they're in, because those opportunities will not come around if they cannot match the team's leader in O'Ward.
What will be the impact of Gavin Ward's depature?
The team made headlines throughout 2024 for the revolving door of drivers that surrounded the No.6 entry. After Álex Palou abandoned his contract with the team after he looked primed to race the entry in 2024, the team snapped up David Malukas for the full season.
However, after Malukas suffered a pre-season mountain biking injury, the team drafted Callum Ilott in for the opening rounds. With Ilott having clashes with his commitments in the World Endurance Championship, the team signed defending F2 Champion Pourchaire to complete the full season, before dropping him after five races in favour of Siegel.
You might have thought the personnel merry-go-round would stop there, but in the off-season, Ward was removed as Team Principal, many believe due to the team not reaching its internal goal of fighting for championships.
Ward had a high reputation, particularly on the engineering side of things after his experience in Formula One, but some deem that he was not fit for the role of Team Principal. The team have opted for 2004 series champion Kanaan to figurehead the team going forward, a particularly different stance to what most other teams do in the paddock.
O'Ward said on the topic: "I think Tony is as qualified as anybody to be leading this group of people that -- yes, he was a racing driver and he still says he's a racing driver, but I'd call him retired. He is and has knowledge, experience of everything. He can dip his toes into marketing and communications. He can dip his toes with all the partners. He can dip his toes with his opinions with the drivers, especially with Nolan, that he's coming into the team.
"I know he did a couple races last year, but I think he will be a very good mentor for him, as I'm trying to be. It seems kind of weird, I've always been the baby of the team but now I'm the old guy. I want them to succeed, as well, because them succeeding means that -- I know that's just going to drive me forward and make me better, and when we've got two or three cars fighting, it's very different to having one car fighting at the front, and ultimately that's what you need in order to keep up with three strong cars.
"I trust the decisions that have been made, and I told Zak I'm completely behind everything that has been done, and I'm always up to take on something else if there is an area that needs a little bit of attention and help."
It was once again a stunning twist of events in the McLaren stable, and Kanaan will need to prove that he is the one capable of leading McLaren to championships.
Comments