Carlin Racing announced today in a press release that Conor Daly will pilot the No. 59 Chevrolet for Carlin Racing in Saturday’s DXC Technology 600 at Texas Motor Speedway (coverage begins at 8pm ET on NBCSN).
Daly replaces Max Chilton, who will sit out the four remaining oval races on this season’s schedule. Chilton will continue to compete for Carlin in all five remaining road/street course races.
“I want to thank everyone at Carlin and Gallagher for the opportunity to get back in a race car at Texas,” Daly said.
“I thoroughly enjoyed working with Carlin back in 2011 as I started my European racing journey and to now drive for them in the NTT IndyCar Series is pretty special. I look forward to being able to contribute to the team as best I can.”
Texas will mark the second IndyCar start for Daly this season. He finished 10th for Andretti Autosport in last month’s Indianapolis 500.
Carlin has not yet announced who will replace Chilton at Iowa, Pocono and Gateway.
Chilton did not cite an exact reason for stepping away from ovals, but noted INDYCAR’s planned 2020 introduction of a new aero screen for all cars.
“I’m excited and pleased by the outstanding proactive work being done by INDYCAR around driver safety and the innovation of the solution developed in partnership with Red Bull Advanced Technologies that has created a new aero screen,” he said. “The innovative solution will be the most advanced single-seater driver head protection in the world and will be introduced in 2020.
“My focus remains on getting the best possible results for the No. 59 Gallagher Carlin crew, and I will be helping the team and Conor in any way I can to that end.”