LEBANON, Tenn. (Sept. 15, 2024) -- Santino Ferrucci and Sting Ray Robb closed out the 2024 NTT INDYCAR season with valiant drives in the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix at Nashville Superspeedway this afternoon.
Ferrucci notched his personal record 11th top-10 finish of the season in the No. 14 Sexton Properties Chevrolet with his sixth place finish. He also moved from 10th to ninth in the driver's championship for his career best standing.
Qualifying fifth for his second-best run of the season, he was slapped with a nine-spot grid penalty because the crew had to change the engine after final practice as a precautionary measure. They did not finish until 1 a.m.
Santino chats with his performance engineer Adam Kolesar (L) and race engineer James Schnabel.
Starting 14th, he worked his way into the top-10 by lap 40 and never left. At one point he incurred a penalty for a pass made under the yellow line going down the frontstretch. He exceeded the track limits because Kyle Kirkwood ran him tight and Ferrucci did not back off. He was forced to give back the position to Kirkwood plus one more, dropping Ferrucci to ninth.
Undeterred, he made up the positions in the next 25 laps. A caution on lap 135 for Marcus Ericsson who slid up to the turn 4 wall saw the leaders pit for their third of four stops. Ferrucci lamented that his car was just "coming alive."
When the pit stops cycled out, Ferrucci was in fifth, looking at his third top-five of the season but a final round of pit stops as fuel strategies came into play saw him drop to sixth which is where he finished.
Santino hugs his crew chief Didier Francesia after the race.
"A really tough race today," Ferrucci said afterwards. "I think the grid penalty hurt me more than I initially thought, but we fought really hard all day to keep the No. 14 Sexton Properties Chevy up front. The crew was awesome in the pits, incredible stops. We had a great strategy. Everything really kind of went our way to get another top five, and we just kind of fell short there right at the end. But overall, incredible day. We locked ninth in the drivers' championship. Just really great execution these last few events, to do what we've done as a team. Really proud of our guys."
"We've moved up 10 whole positions in the Championship from last year to this year," he continued. "We have two top-fives, a record setting top-10s for the team (in the modern era), and just the progression between what we've done with the mechanics, the engineering staff, myself as a driver, and Larry with the strategies. Everybody in general, has just been incredible. And you know, the growth really shows."
Robb's drive could be considered even more impressive because of the physical challenges he was facing in the 206-lap race.
Thrilled with his No. 41 Goodheart/Pray.com Chevrolet after final practice last night where he was seventh just behind Ferrucci, Robb was optimistic about his chances in the race. However, a severe bout of food poisoning had him up most of the night. After a visit to the infield care center this morning and some IV fluids, he buckled down for the race.
Starting 23rd, he moved into 20th by his first pit stop on lap 42. The team committed to a three-stop race so he had to save fuel throughout the race. However, the timely cautions allowed for the four-stop strategy to play out the best among the top-10 finishers. Robb was running 17th when he had to do a massive fuel save in the final laps and slipped back to 21st. That position drop saw his car edged out of the Leaders Circle program by just one point. Robb finished 20th in the driver rankings.
However, the fortitude he showed to not only show up but compete while still battling the effects of the overnight illness belied a strength of character--and a 23-year-old in otherwise top physical shape.
“After yesterday‘s qualifying, we were very hopeful," Robb said. "We thought we had a really, really good race car. In qualifying, we would’ve been top-10, if we didn’t have the issue with the fuel pressure dropping out. So today was going to be a good day but food poisoning last night was a difficult thing to deal with so unfortunately, we were dealing with that today. I feel like we somewhat maximized the event but it wasn’t quite enough. Overall, I think we learned a lot this year. This team is definitely on the rise and I think that they’re gonna be one of the winners consistently next year.”
Commenting on the year overall, Robb revealed, "Santino was a great teammate this year. I learned a lot from him as well as the rest of the crew, Michael Cannon, Mike (Armbrester), Collin (Hendershot), plus Adam (Kolesar) and James (Schnabel)--all those guys are a wealth of knowledge, they're a good brain trust. I know that they’re going to succeed because of who they are, their passions and where they want to go."
Colton Herta won for his first oval track victory after starting ninth. Pato O'Ward finished second. Rounding out the top five were Josef Newgarden, pole winner Kirkwood and Scott McLaughlin.
Summing up the race, Team President Larry Foyt said, "Nashville is certainly an interesting track for us with the concrete surface; it proved to be a really hard-racing oval. I think both of our teams did a really good job to have good cars for the race. We had a couple penalties with Santino's car, but he fought hard all day for a strong sixth place finish. Great way to end the season. And Sting Ray faced a lot of adversity today. He had food poisoning overnight but just buckled down and did the best he could. We came up a little short on getting into the Leader’s Circle, but he and our 41 team did a good job all year. I think Sting Ray learned a lot."
Alex Palou finished 11th to clinch his third INDYCAR Series title in four years. Herta's win vaulted him to second in the final standings. Rounding out the top 10 were: Scott McLaughlin, Will Power, O'Ward, Scott Dixon, Kirkwood, Josef Newgarden, Ferrucci and Alexander Rossi.
Reflecting on the 2024 season, Foyt said, "All in all, it was a really good year for AJ Foyt Racing. I think we showed that we’re headed in the right direction. Right now, it feels like a long winter ahead but I think it will go by really fast because we have a lot of projects lined up. We are focusing on the areas where we want to improve, but we are really excited to go racing again in 2025."
