One of the key dominos to the Verizon IndyCar Series silly season prognosticating for 2018 is whether Andretti Autosport will stick with Honda or switch to Chevrolet for its powerplant.
Luckily for its second longest tenured driver in Ryan Hunter-Reay, with the stability of a long-term contract in place with the team and with DHL and having had success with both manufacturers, it doesn’t particularly matter.
Hunter-Reay is one of only three full-time drivers on the grid who have both an IndyCar championship (2012) and an Indianapolis 500 victory (2014) on his resume (Scott Dixon, Tony Kanaan) and achieved them with separate manufacturers.
Andretti’s team went with Chevrolet when engine competition came back into the series in 2012, while the team switched back to Honda in 2014 as Chip Ganassi Racing went the other way from Honda to Chevrolet.
“It’s funny; I’m an Andretti Autosport driver and a DHL brand representative. But on the engine front, I’m usually one of the last to know!” Hunter-Reay told NBC Sports.
“Michael takes care of the business decisions. So I have a great relationship with both brands, and have won with both manufacturers. And we’ll keep our head down and focused. The only goal is to win races, regardless of which engine is powering us.”
Hunter-Reay is thankful to be solidified in his place at Andretti Autosport as the team - perhaps - and the series in general is poised for a busy “silly season” of movement, depending on the manufacturer selection.
Despite starting out with a limited number of races only with the team in 2010, a key win at Long Beach helped lay the groundwork for Hunter-Reay’s eventual consistent tenure driving the No. 28 DHL car - which became No. 1 in 2013 after he won the previous year’s title.
Considering from 2003 to 2009, Hunter-Reay’s open-wheel career took a variety of twists and turns, he’s appreciative of the support shown by all that has kept him gainfully employed.
“It’s been so nice. Obviously it’s been good to be in a position to work to be at Andretti Autosport, starting in 2010. But with more success with DHL; that started to accumulate. Then I became a DHL brand ambassador. They’re family to me,” he said.
“We’ve won a good amount of races, a championship and an Indy 500, but we need to do a lot more. We’re all so hungry. There’s no comfort or complacency in any way being here, but it’s nice knowing I’ll have the 28 DHL car for several more years to come.”
Pocono is a critical cross point for Hunter-Reay as he comes to this weekend’s ABC Supply 500 (Sunday, 2 p.m. ET, NBCSN), as it’s the two-year mark since his most recent win in the series at this race. He probably could have won last year had it not been for a mysterious electronics glitch that knocked him to the back of the field, before he recovered to third.
With Andretti Autosport having captured three of the six 500-mile superspeedway races since the manufacturer aero kit introduction in 2015 - Hunter-Reay at Pocono that year, then Alexander Rossi and Takuma Sato in the last two Indianapolis 500s - the team must be considered a favorite heading into this weekend’s race.
Especially, perhaps, if it might mark the team’s last superspeedway race for the foreseeable future with a Honda powerplant in the back.