Santino Ferrucci has a lot to look forward to.
For one, he is back in Tulsa for his fifth attempt at the Chili Bowl Midget Nationals on the same week he just signed an extension to remain a full-time IndyCar Series driver at AJ Foyt Racing. There is unfinished business in both.
First, in IndyCar, he wants another chance at Indianapolis so badly after a caution with four laps to go negated a chance to draft by eventual winner Josef Newgarden. Instead, he had to settle for a podium, which is a great accomplishment for himself and the team … if he can ever get past the disappointment.
“Really, for me, it’s just about wanting another shot with them at the 500,” Ferrucci said. “It’s hard to ever feel like that race is in your hands and then it was ripped away due to back markers crashing. Well, they’re racing for something too, but what something, I can’t tell you. That’s also part of the sport, but to have an opportunity to chase that again would be huge.”
The team will have Team Penske support next year and ‘that could be huge too,’ he says.
Ferrucci will pair with Sting Ray Robb at Foyt next season with Benjamin Pederson the odd man out in one of the biggest questions of the IndyCar offseason.
On one hand, that third place run with 11 laps led was the only top-10 of the season for Ferrucci. On the other hand, the driver was able to finish 19th in points, securing a one-million-dollar leader’s circle program payout too.
Beyond the team getting better, Ferrucci says he has homework to do too.
“Really, a lot of it is just about how I give feedback,” he said. “Take Iowa, we went nowhere in Iowa, and that thing was definitely terrifying to drive. So for me, giving better direction to the engineering guys. We’ve found some things, data wise, that wasn’t computing from paper to application over the winter. Having a lot of those things figured out and leadership group coming together is good too.”
So having that done before his Friday qualifying run at Chili Bowl has Ferrucci feeling good about his race craft in every facet.
“I’m comfortable being full-time in IndyCar, and then coming here, I feel like I am a better driver all around,” he said.
“It’s a good headspace.”
Ferrucci has improved in every trip to Tulsa since 2020 with championship finishes of K7, G10 and G6. What are the expectations now?
“We should be top-10 or no worse than top-15 in our prelim night,” he said. “It’s about consistency but also a little bit of Chili Bowl luck with the heats, slapping it into a qualifier and go from there. It’ll be good. The car is quick. I’m really good on the bottom, right now. It’s just being more consistent when I run the top.”
What is the one area he feels like he needs to improve?
“As far as race craft goes, the racing is the racing,” Ferrucci said. “I just need to get into 1 and 3 better. The last little bit of confidence. The fine line between overkill and undershoot.
“It’s so narrow here and it’s the one that having laps will help close in on. If I can narrow that down on Friday, we can be rather competitive.”
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.