Indy Car Series News
All you need to know ahead of the fifth round of the 2022 NTT IndyCar Series – the GMR Grand Prix of Indianapolis on the Indy road course.
Event date: Friday, May 13 – Saturday, May 14
Track: 2.439-mile, 14-turn road course in Indianapolis, IN.
Race distance: 85 laps (207.315 miles)
Firestone tire allotment: Six sets of primary tires (with an extra set available to rookies for use in first practice), four sets of alternate tires and five sets of rain tires.
Push-to-pass parameters: 200 seconds of total time with a maximum single duration of 20 seconds.
IndyCar schedule (local/Eastern Time) and broadcast details
Friday, April 29
9.30-10.30pm – First practice – Peacock Premium
12.45-1.45pm – Second practice – Peacock Premium
4.00pm – Qualifying – Peacock Premium
Saturday, April 30
10.30-11.00am – Warm-up – Peacock Premium
3.00pm – Pre-race build-up – NBC
3.39pm – “Drivers, start your engines”
3.45pm – Green flag: GMR Grand Prix – NBC
Leigh Diffey is the announcer alongside analysts Townsend Bell and James Hinchcliffe. All NTT IndyCar Series practice sessions and qualifying stream live on Peacock Premium, NBC’s direct-to-consumer livestreaming product, while Peacock Premium’s exclusive post-race show will be streamed following the race.
IndyCar Radio Network broadcasts: Mark Jaynes is the chief announcer alongside analyst Davey Hamilton. Nick Yeoman, Jake Query and Michael Young are the turn announcers, while Ryan Myrehn and Rob Blackman are pit reporters. All IndyCar races, practices and qualifying sessions air live on network affiliates, SiriusXM 160, racecontrol.indycar.com and the IndyCar app powered by NTT DATA.
Race Notes
2021 race winner: Rinus VeeKay (Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet).
2021 pole winner: Romain Grosjean (Dale Coyne Racing-Honda), 69.4396sec, 126.447mph.
Qualifying lap record: Will Power (Team Penske-Chevrolet) 67.7044sec, 129.687mph, 2017 during Q3.
This will be the 12th IndyCar race held on the IMS road course including all Grands Prix of Indy, 2020’s Harvest GP double-header and the 2021 Gallagher Grand Prix). Will Power has won on this course five times, Simon Pagenaud three times while Scott Dixon, Josef Newgarden and Rinus VeeKay have each won here once.
In qualifying, Power has landed five poles, while Pato O’Ward, Grosjean, VeeKay, Felix Rosenqvist, Pagenaud and Sebastian Saavedra have one apiece.
In terms of teams Penske has won eight of the 11 races on the IMS road course, while the remaining three were clinched by Chip Ganassi Racing, Ed Carpenter Racing and, in the 2014 inaugural event, what was then known as Schmidt Peterson Motorsports but is now Arrow McLaren SP.
Josef Newgarden could clinch the PeopleReady Force For Good Challenge’s $1 million prize by winning on Saturday, as it would complete his set of winning an oval, a street course and a road course in the same season. The PeopleReady prize would grant him a $500,000 bonus and a matching $500,000 donation for his chosen charities, namely, Wags and Walk Nashville and SeriousFun Children’s Network.
Five of the six rookies – Tatiana Calderon, Devlin DeFrancesco, Callum Ilott, Kyle Kirkwood and David Malukas – will all be making their first IndyCar starts on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course. The sixth rookie, Christian Lundgaard of Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda, will be making his second start, as this was the venue for his IndyCar debut last August, when he qualified a startling fourth.
