There’s no surprises contained within the field of 21 cars for this week’s Prix View test, the first full-field running of the Verizon IndyCar Series this season, which takes place Friday and Saturday at Phoenix Raceway.
The 13 Hondas include four cars apiece from Chip Ganassi Racing Teams and Andretti Autosport, with two cars each from Schmidt Peterson Motorsports and Dale Coyne Racing, and a single car from Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.
Chevrolet’s eight cars are broken down into four Team Penske cars, and two cars each from A.J. Foyt Enterprises and Ed Carpenter Racing.
Perhaps the biggest surprise is the absence of primary sponsors listed for most of the 21 cars. The only sponsor names listed are:
- Nos. 4 and 14 ABC Supply AJ Foyt Racing Chevrolet
- No. 5 Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports Honda
- No. 8 Gallagher Chip Ganassi Racing Honda
- No. 10 NTT Data Honda
- No. 83 Tresiba Honda
- No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet
- No. 28 DHL Honda
Teams such as Penske (Verizon, Hitachi, Rev Group, PPG, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Menards), Andretti (hhgregg) and Carpenter (Fuzzy’s Vodka) have announced sponsors for the year, but perhaps have not indicated them for this test. RLL is the same way, having brought in a number of sponsors in the last couple years.
The No. 9 car for Scott Dixon, which saw Target end its sponsorship, is the biggest question mark right now without a sponsor yet listed there. To be fair to the Chip Ganassi Racing Teams outfit though, it could well be a case where the sponsor is confirmed, but not yet announced by the team.
With the test being a couple weeks earlier than last year, this might leave teams an opportunity to do a formal unveil of their cars - or sponsors - in the weeks between now and the March 12 season opener at St. Petersburg.
IndyCar returns to NBCSN on April 9 at Long Beach, and the Phoenix race is April 29, also on NBCSN.