Chevrolet IndyCar program manager Chris Berube wants to see the bow tie on a few more cars in this year’s IndyCar series, which obviously includes the legendary Indianapolis 500.
NASCAR’s Kurt Busch and A.J. Allmendinger both want to do the proverbial “double” by driving in this years’s 500 – and later that same day in Sprint Cup’s most grueling race of the season, the Coca-Cola 600.
Busch is entering his first season with Stewart Haas Racing. Allmendinger, likewise, will be in his first full year with JTG Daugherty Racing.
Can you say no-brainer?
The common thread with both drivers and their Indy 500 hopes is Chevrolet. Stewart Haas runs Chevy bodies and motors prepared by Hendrick Motorsports, while JTG-D switched this year from Toyota to Chevy’s prepared by Richard Childress Racing.
In this day and age of marketing and branding oftentimes being more powerful than the actual driver or competition itself, Busch and The Dinger may already be halfway home in their hopes to race at Indy with their current Chevy connections. It would be Busch’s first time in the 500, and Allmendinger’s second time (he finished seventh in last year’s classic).
“We are less than what we supplied last year, and that was the level we’d like to be at,” Berube told Racer magazine about Chevy’s overall IndyCar season plans. “So we can take on another couple of cars this year.
“Whether it comes from our existing teams adding cars or a new team … it’s a little more difficult to add a whole new team than it is to add cars, but as it stands we’re at 11 cars, and last year it was 13 for most of the season.”
Busch and Allmendinger would fit quite nicely into Chevy’s Indy plan, but it’s not like we’ll have to have a tag day for Chevy in terms of the overall season. It still has some very powerful teams in its camp including Team Penske, Chip Ganassi’s Team Target, KV Racing Technology (which won last year’s 500 with Tony Kanaan, who has moved to the Ganassi camp for 2014), Ed Carpenter Racing and Panther Racing.
“The depth of the talent is stout,” Berube told Racer. “I don’t think we’re any worse off this year [in that regard]. But we all have to grow, and we have to give them more power and more durability.
“We’re pretty happy [with the new engine]. We’re fine tuning now, but that’s very important — that could be the difference between a race-winning application, and one that just creates power. The drivers have to know how to wield it.”
Now admittedly this is pure speculation, but one dark horse possibility for Busch or Allmendinger – or potentially both – would be to drive for Dragon Racing in the Indy 500. While Dragon is not running the full IndyCar schedule this season, it will be at Indianapolis, according to team owner Jay Penske, son of Roger Penske.
And with Dragon likely to once again be powered by Chevy, again, can you say no-brainer?
Granted, Busch is being courted by several teams, including Andretti Autosport, although it has shifted to Honda power for the upcoming season, which could be a deal-breaker for Busch.
But with other potential suitors including Ganassi, KV Racing and Ed Carpenter Racing, surely a Chevy-powered NASCAR driver – or two – should be able to find available rides with a bow tie team for May’s “Greatest Spectacle in Racing,” don’t you think?
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