Travis Hinkle/IMS Photo

By Marshall Pruett - Jan 29, 2026, 4:00 PM ET

Cindric returns to Penske as McLaughlin’s race strategist

Tim Cindric’s next job in the sport will be with a familiar group as Team Penske’s former president has accepted an offer to return and serve as Scott McLaughlin’s race strategist with the No. 3 Team Penske Chevy IndyCar program.

The surprising development comes with a role that will be limited to race weekends, which aligns with Cindric’s desire to stay in motor racing, but in a part-time capacity that allows him to dedicate his energies to family and other business interests. It’s a shift Cindric initiated at the end of 2024 where he stepped back from running all of Roger Penske’s racing programs – other than NASCAR – for the better part of a quarter century to concentrate solely on IndyCar.

After his Penske exit following the contretemps in May, Cindric took the rest of the year to decide which path he wanted to pursue and fielded a number of inquiries to run a range of racing teams. A chance outreach to Team Penske president Jonathan Diuguid led to the building of a new bridge that was never anticipated.

“At the end of the year, I said to myself, 'I need to make a decision here and either retire from racing and just go on and go about my life, or I need to do something in ’26,'” Cindric told RACER. “I felt like I needed to do something, but I still wanted to stay true to the fact that I wanted flexibility in life. I'm not opposed to working full-time, but I’ve been there, done that in a lot of ways, and I hadn't really found anything that was different than what I had done before.

“So I started considering some of these opportunities that I had to go back and just work on the weekends, or do some part-time stuff here and there, because I missed the competition. Six months ago, I probably would have told you that this wasn't something that was in the cards, Then I got some offers where I thought that might not be a bad gig, all things considered, and when I left [Penske], I told them I really didn’t think I’d be looking to come back.

“But I changed my mind and wanted to tell them first, so after the first of the year, I sent JD [Diuguid] a note that basically said, ‘Hey, reaching out to you to let you know that I'm pursuing a path to where I'm seriously considering being a race strategist.’ And I told him, ‘I feel as though you probably already have your bases covered, but If not, I'd be open to a conversation.’”

Diuguid was open to having a conversation. Despite the unfortunate manner in which their relationship met its end, Cindric’s decades of winning championships and Indianapolis 500s as a race strategist was too much to overlook as the team attempts to recapture its competitive edge.

“The way I would describe it is, it's my job to always make sure the best players are going to play,” Diuguid said. “And Tim's used that phrase before, as well as Roger. Just because a decision may bring on some difficult conversations, it doesn't make it the wrong one. Much like everybody else who is going to be surprised by this, I was surprised that Tim reached out, but I was glad that he did.

“We've known each other for a long time, and professionally, we didn't see eye to eye on several occasions, but that that's going to happen over the period of time that we had, and I think that's what built the relationship for him to make that call and then be able to have quite an open discussion about what it could be or what it couldn't be. And in the end, it was definitely the right thing for us.

“We’ve done a lot of restructuring in the team, and being able to bring somebody like Tim back on board puts us in a very strong position, and can allow us to have more capacity to focus on all the stuff that we've been trying to do through the middle of summer and through the winter, to put the team back to where it needs to be. I couldn't be more excited about it, to be honest.”
Cindric's connection with McLaughlin goes back to his days as a Supercars ace. Daniel Kalisz/Getty Images

Cindric was McLaughlin’s first point of contact at Team Penske when he was an emerging talent in the Australian Supercars series. Cindric would play a central role in bringing the New Zealander to IndyCar after he won three Supercars titles and the Bathurst 1000 for DJR Team Penske, and in his previous role McLaughlin knew Cindric as the team-wide leader who bore more responsibilities than any other person.

Having Cindric on his timing stand, and without the weight of running Team Penske, could be a transformational move as the Kiwi looks to win his first IndyCar championship.

“This feels like the most incredible gift,” McLaughlin said. “I’m tremendously honored to have Tim with us on the Thirsty 3s. He’s achieved so much in this sport already, and to call him part of the Thirsty 3s is kind of weird, but he is one of us and I understand what he's done for our team for many years. Tim is a friend of mine, and now to go into racing and battle with him as a friend, and a guy that's just completely and utterly focused on me, from a race strategy perspective, to have that focus from a guy that's got the competitiveness and tenacity to be the best, it's a huge honor.”

Diuguid saw the pairing of Cindric with McLaughlin as a natural fit.

“Everything is purposeful and the reason we hadn’t announced strategists or anything like that is because we were all taking the time to make sure we made the right decisions,” he said. “And considering all that, putting Tim with Scott means he’s in an extremely strong position. Tim has all the experience and everything needed to succeed and we’re trying to make sure Scott is supported every level that he can be to be as successful as possible.”

 

The "Impossible" Wheelie Bar That Baffled The NHRA: A Forward Weight Secret?

Let's listen closely to the philosophy involved in why......

Look closely at the last wheelie bar pic and see what else is different from the first w.Bar pic.....

If it's not in the rule book, it's not cheating...Smokey Yunick

Legacy Motoring
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5,937 views Feb 28, 2026 #NHRA #DragRacing #WheelieBar
The "Impossible" Wheelie Bar That Baffled The NHRA: A Forward Weight Secret? In the highly competitive world of drag racing, weight transfer is everything. But what happens when a brilliant Texas mechanic engineers a custom modification that completely defies the laws of physics? In this video, we uncover the mystery behind the weird wheelie bar that outsmarted the NHRA rulebook by doing the exact opposite of what it was supposed to do: transferring weight forward.

For decades, Pro Stock and top-tier NHRA teams have spent millions on drag car suspension secrets, hunting for any aerodynamic or mechanical advantage they can find. Yet, one local builder managed to hide an engineering masterpiece right in plain sight. We are breaking down the science of drag racing weight transfer, how this specific wheelie bar design worked, and why the NHRA had to scramble to figure out what was going on.

Was it an illegal drag racing mod, or just pure mechanical genius? Dive into one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in drag racing history. If you love deep dives into banned racing tech, stealthy horsepower secrets, and the mechanics who pushed the absolute limits of the drag strip, you won't want to miss this. Don't forget to hit subscribe for more stories on the forgotten ghost engines and banned rules of motorsport history! #NHRA#DragRacing#WheelieBar#CarMechanic#RacingHistory Disclaimer:

This video is for educational and entertainment purposes only. The stories, mechanical breakdowns, and racing history discussed are based on historical accounts, public records, and technical analysis. We do not encourage or condone the use of illegal modifications, unsafe driving practices, or violating track rules in any sanctioned motorsport or street driving environment.

All racing footage and images are used under fair use guidelines for documentary and analytical purposes. NHRA drag racing secrets,banned NHRA modifications,Texas mechanic outsmarts NHRA,weird wheelie bar physics,how to transfer weight forward in drag racing,Pro Stock rule breakers,drag racing weight transfer explained,illegal drag racing mods,fastest NHRA passes,custom wheelie bar design,drag car suspension secrets,drag racing history mysteries,NHRA technical violations,drag car tuning tips,racing engineering secrets,street outlaws,drag racing tech explained,banned drag racing rules

 

Joe SkibinskiPenske Entertainment

By Marshall Pruett - Mar 3, 2026, 1:04 PM ET

Usually the people yelling cheat are people who haven't planned well enough.

Easy to accuse, hard to prove with no evidence.. I'm reluctant to even use the C-word.

I am reluctant to even listen to someone yell the C-word when they have nothing to go on.

Why don't you loud mouths shut your mouths and learn how to drive and make your tires last!!

Remember Senna years ago who had figured out how to drive in the wet?

The loudmouths ran their mouths, and one race was even stopped early before Senna could get to the front. Nowadays, everybody drives in the wet the way Senna drove in the wet.

Is Palou cheating? No, he's the cheat code

If, as the old saying goes, "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery," where would accusations of cheating fall into the realm of adulation?

After their latest rollicking win, some folks are indeed struggling to accept what they’re seeing from Alex Palou and his Chip Ganassi Racing team. Especially when the No. 10 Honda squad pulled another upset after starting fourth at St. Petersburg and amassing leads that exceeded 10 seconds on two separate occasions. The trigger point is how the winning takes place.

“When Palou took the lead in St. Pete and built a 10-second lead in 10 laps, everyone, including me, started to wonder how that’s possible in a spec series without any tampering or fishiness to their car,” one such fan said in an outreach. “Add to that Ganassi’s lack of onboard cameras and I could see a recipe for some major conspiracies. Thoughts?” Yeah. Losers with not enough talent are full of bull manure.

It’s easier, it appears, to question the legality of what they’re witnessing – safer to point to exploiting of loopholes or allege skullduggery – than to accept the fantastical performances being produced by the No. 10 Honda team as honest or earned. Similar accusatory responses were elicited last year when Palou won five out of the first six races, eight total out of 17, and ran away with his fourth championship in five years.

Painting the achievements of a generational talent driving for the best team of the decade – so far, at least – as a byproduct of cheating takes no effort or evidence, which is unfortunate. But it speaks to the difficulty some have in processing Palou’s achievements or his level of skill.

Maybe you jerks should read what he actually did, you buttheads!

So is he cheating, or is Palou the ultimate cheat code?

When it comes to the spec Dallara DW12 and all of its hybrid heft, Palou has mastered the art of finding the limit of adhesion and living a few decimal points below its razor-sharp edge.

His driving is often described in boring terms like "tidy," "clean" and "efficient." They’re a perfect fit for this car. And as the records show with 20 wins from 99 starts, "devastating" is another word that belongs among his descriptors.

Today’s DW12 is known as a killer of tires when drivers push beyond their limit and reach the point of sliding the fronts too often with bouts of understeer or locked brakes, or murdering the rears by repeatedly feeding in opposite lock to correct oversteer.

And we aren’t talking about huge, demonstrative drifts with IndyCar drivers visibly sawing at their steering wheels. The tire-ending moments are subtle, small, and lightning fast; a swift accumulation of little corrections that accelerate rises in tire temperatures and rapid losses of grip.

Run the video back from St. Petersburg, or pretty much any of Palou’s races, and you won’t find him slewing sideways, or smoking tires through errant applications of the brake or the throttle pedal. Palou’s super power is control, precision, and consistency with that control and precision.

If the tires start to surrender when driven at 100 percent, Palou hits 99.8 percent and lives at that self-induced threshold. I

f they can withstand less, he dials his metronomic limit down.

 

part 2 Tire planning



And if, by chance, the tires can take more punishment than usual, he adjusts his limit accordingly and performs at that elevated level without tipping over the tire-killing line. Tidy. Clean. Efficient.
One of Palou's superpowers is knowing exactly how much punishment his tires can take, and then pushing them right up to – but never over – that precise point. Gavin Baker/Getty Images

“He's just so consistent,” Chris Simmons, Ganassi’s director of performance, said of Palou after the race. “He doesn't make any mistakes, and he's super easy on the tires. So on lap one and two, that looks good, but that compounds over the run. So by lap 10, it looks superhuman. And by the end of the run, it looks like he's Iron Man.”

Understanding Palou’s ability to overcut polesitter Scott McLaughlin and front row starter Marcus Ericsson on Sunday begins with the tire choices he made for the race.

As Palou’s race strategist Barry Wanser often shares, his driver leads the tire-choice decisions, and in this case, Palou opted to start on new Firestone alternates, which were a major question mark leading into the race.

Teams knew the new street course alternates were more durable than last year’s short-life specials, but hadn’t run enough laps in the heat of the day on the 2026 alternates to know how long they’d last before degradation set in and a heavy reduction in grip would take place. The longest runs anyone got on the alternates came in the pre-race warmup, which was cool and overcast. By the afternoon, the skies were blue and conditions were warm, which led to a lack of confidence in the alternate’s durability.

Palou ultimately chose a two-stop race, which involved rolling the dice on whether he could make the new alternates last long enough to stick to the two-stop plan. If he couldn’t run until at least the one-third point in the 100-lap race, Palou would need to abandon the two-stopper and shift to three stops, which would have ruined his shot at victory.

The risk was real in that regard – the best driver on a three-stop strategy placed ninth at St. Petersburg.
In the end, the gamble paid off. Palou was one of only four drivers among the 25 starters to make the two-stop plan work while starting on new alternates; Romain Grosjean who finished eighth, Ganassi affiliate Meyer Shank Racing with Marcus Armstrong in 11th, and Ganassi teammate Kyffin Simpson in 15th were the others.

From there, Palou made a pass to take third from rookie Dennis Hauger on the opening lap and stayed there until the first round of pit stops approached. McLaughlin opened from pole on new Firestone primaries, which everyone knew were long lasting, and led until he pitted for used alternates on lap 35. Behind him, Andretti Global’s Marcus Ericsson also started on new primaries and inherited the lead for a lap before matching McLaughlin’s strategy by stopping on lap 36 and bolting on used alternates for the middle section of the race.

Their strategy was clear: Start on the safer but slower primes, run just past the one-third point in the race, then split the last two stints on the faster alternates. They’d run the second stint on their best used alternates and save the new alternates for last, giving themselves the highest quality rubber with the most life to consume in the run to the finish line. It was a case of going good-better-best with their tire compound sequencing.

Palou went in the opposite direction with best-better-good.

If you do what the other guys do, you will get what the other guys got.

His strategy centered on trying to make up ground and possibly build an advantage on the fastest tires in the first two stints before closing on the slower primes with the hope of having enough of a buffer to where those finishing on new alternates would cut into the amount of lead, but not to the point of getting past him.
The first strike by Palou came with the timing of his first pit stop, which was on lap 38. He managed to go three laps longer than McLaughlin and two more than Ericsson on their new primes… while using the new alternates with the unknown durability.

It’s a small thing in terms of laps; Palou only went a bit longer than McLaughlin and Ericsson in front of him on primes, but he was able to make immense speed on those new alternates, and for 38 laps. It was a monumental achievement.


McLaughlin had an early advantage on the harder prime Firestones, but Palou – here lurking in the background – was able to stretch his unproven alternates even further. Brandon Badraoui/Getty Images

He also took great care of those tires, which allowed him to set his fastest lap of the race on lap 37 – his in-lap – with a 1m02.8281s. McLaughlin’s in lap was 0.7306s slower with a 1m03.5587s.

Look to their first two out laps on cold tires, and keep in mind that Palou and McLaughlin took used alternates, which meant they were on the same compound for the first time, and Palou was 0.2842s faster to start.

Next, as McLaughlin and Ericsson fought each other – along with MSR’s Armstrong, who made it a three-way party – while trying to get their tires up to temperature, Palou was 1.2955s quicker on his second flying lap on used alternates.

 

Part 3 Tire planning



Prior to the first round of pit stops, Palou kept things close, sat just over a second back from McLaughlin, was able to go a few more laps than McLaughlin before pitting, and was markedly faster on those extra laps. Then, on the first few laps after emerging from the pits, Palou was faster still as his closest pursuers slowed themselves while their battles for second and third raged on.
The running order on lap 50 was Palou, Ericsson, and McLaughlin. On that lap, while all three were on used alternates, it remained tight as Palou turned a 1m03.6s while the other two clocked 1m03.8s. And then the effects of Palou’s tidy-clean-efficient driving started to stand out as the trio put more miles on their used alternates.

On lap 54, for example, Palou was flying with a 1m03.0s tour; Ericsson could only muster a 1m03.8s and McLaughlin was at a 1m04.0s even, losing between 0.8s and 1.0s on that lap alone.

Palou’s consistently unmatchable pace in this stanza is where the race was won. His laps 58 and 59 were nearly identical at 1m03.1937s and 1m03.1926s. Ericsson, in second place, turned a 1m03.7361s and a 1m04.0041s for a combined loss of 1.3539s to Palou in just two laps.

Back on lap 50, when the Palou and his closest pursuers ran almost the same lap time on relatively fresh used alternates, his lead over Ericsson was 1.6s and McLaughlin was down by 3.8s. But as their tires reached and went past the mid-point of the stint – as their usability was about to meet an abrupt end – Palou struck with control and precision and consistency.

What was a 1.6s lead on lap 50 became 7.0s on pure speed by lap 60, and making that extra speed without abusing his tires. Palou kept going until lap 67, and by that point, McLaughlin had overtaken Ericsson, who was struggling to keep his used alternates alive, and it cost everyone chasing Palou – including McLaughlin – a ton of time as they got bottled up behind the Andretti driver.
By the time McLaughlin got by Ericsson, Palou had disappeared – thanks to his pace and the slowing effect Ericsson had on the field – to the tune of 13.8 second on lap 66. Credit Palou for the advantage he amassed, but don’t discount Ericsson’s effect on amplifying that lead by holding and fading in second place while keeping faster cars in third and fourth place at bay for so long.

With their final pit stops beckoning, Palou took used primes on lap 67 and McLaughlin went in for his candy – the new alternates – to start the fightback on lap 68.

Every other driver who finished inside the top eight at St. Pete had two new sets of tires, at a minimum, and some had three sets of new tires – optimum rubber from start to finish.
One race into the season, and it already feels like Palou's rivals are on the clock to reel him in. David Jensen/Getty Images

Andretti’s Kyle Kirkwood, on a two-stop strategy as well – but aided by having two sets of new alternates after starting 15th– charged his way to second by lap 77.

Kirkwood did as expected by using his new alternates to slice into Palou’s lead on old primes, and by lap 80, the once-gaudy lead of 13.8s on lap 66 was carved down to 5.5s. With the respective difference of tire grip in mind, and the per-lap time loss he was suffering, Palou wasn’t going to match Kirkwood’s pace. Finally, he was at risk of being overtaken for the lead.

Lap 70 was a perfect indicator of their performance disparity, as the checkered flag awaited everyone on lap 100. Both were just starting their final stints, and with those new alternates giving him an edge, Kirkwood’s lap 70 was 0.8102s quicker than Palou's. Holding the upper hand, Kirkwood did as expected and put his compound and tire age advantage to good use while attacking Palou’s lead. But it didn’t last.
Palou started equaling or beating Kirkwood’s times between laps 80-90 as the Andretti driver’s car lost its balance and started to burn through its alternates. By lap 90, Palou stopped the losses with more of the control, precision, and consistency, and expanded the lead to 6.9s over Kirkwood and 7.9s over McLaughlin, who was preparing to pounce and take second place.

But before that happened, Kirkwood continued to slow. He lost nearly a second per lap to Palou from laps 90-93, which also meant McLaughlin’s distance to Palou was growing as well, and by the time he got around Kirkwood, Palou was gone. It happened to McLaughlin earlier in the race with Ericsson, and again to finish the race with Ericsson’s Andretti teammate, which made it easier for Palou to punch out to double-digit leads.

McLaughlin’s hard-charging efforts to get by Kirkwood also came at a cost to the capabilities of his once-new alternates.

From lap 94 when McLaughlin took second, he was 1.5s slower than Palou on the same lap, 0.4s slower on lap 95, 0.6s slower on lap 96, 0.2s down on lap 97, and 0.6s slower on lap 98. Despite being saddled with used primes, Palou took great care of his tires and had speed left to burn in the waning moments of the race. Over the last two laps – with a monster lead – Palou eased off, running laps at 1m05s while McLaughlin kept hammering away with 1m04s.

At the checkered flag, Palou’s margin of victory over the Team Penske ace was 12.5 seconds.

Palou’s magic was only made fully apparent during the post-race analysis. His opening stint on new alternates lasted 38 laps and his quickest lap of the day was on lap 37, which spoke to how well he cared for the delicate compound.
McLaughlin’s closing stint on new alternates was only 32 laps long, and with Kirkwood out of the way, his last batch of laps on those tires ranged from 1m03.8s to 1m04.4s. Palou, at the end of his beginning stint new alternates, was faster from laps 32-37, reeling off low 1m03s and that 1m02.8s best.

Kirkwood actually posted the fastest lap of the race on his new alternates with a 1m02.2s tour, which was 0.6s better than Palou's, and suggests Palou knew he had more speed in his new alternates, but elected to dial back just a tad to preserve their per-lap capabilities as he stretched that first stint out to lap 38.

And with his formidable lead shrinking fast in the final stint, Palou embraced the same control-precision-consistency mantra and didn’t overact by trying to nullify Kirkwood’s tire and speed advantage from the moment they left the pits.

He and his team knew they’d lose the early battle between old primes and new alternates, and weren’t rattled when a 13.8s lead dwindled to 5.5s. As those new alternates lost their peak on the cars of Kirkwood and McLaughlin, Palou had enough speed held in reserve to regain most of what was temporarily lost and captured the 20th victory of his career while McLaughlin was nowhere to be found at the finish line, 12.5s arrears.

 

Meet Our Latest Project, Chris, Who We're Turning Into a Racer. | Path to the Podium ep.1

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3,311 views May 16, 2026 #driving #sportscars #grm
What’s it going to take to get Chris from an inexperienced rookie to standing on the podium at the SCCA National Time Attack Championship? It’s time to send him through boot camp with Grassroots Motorsports Tech Editor J.G. Pasterjak as his motorsports sensei. #sportscars#driving#grm -------

Path to the Podium is presented by the SCCA. Learn more about them here: https://www.scca.com/ --------- This video is brought to you by: Tire Rack: https://www.tirerack.com VBox Motorsport: https://www.vboxmotorsport.co.uk ---------- Host: J.G. Pasterjak, Grassroots Motorsports Tech Editor Video: Chris Tropea, Grassroots Motorsports Associate Editor ---------- Follow along with the Path to the Podium series online: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/pro... ---------- Looking for our GRM-branded gear, decals, back issues and more?

Get it here: https://store.grassrootsmotorsports.com ---------- Subscribe to GRM+ or our magazine for content like this: https://motorsportmarketing.lpages.co... ---------- More Grassroots Motorsports on the Internet Web: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/#GrassrootsMotorsports#sportscars#GRM

 

Geoff Miller/Lumen via Getty Images

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By David Malsher-Lopez - May 23, 2026, 12:23 PM ET

Perfecting an IndyCar pit stop the RLL way Winning the race in the pits

The Indianapolis 500 isn’t just IndyCar’s biggest race: it’s also the longest in terms of distance, with 200 laps of the 2.5-mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Providing it runs the full distance, the leaders will have made at least five pit stops.

So far in 2026, the Rahal Letterman Lanigan No. 15 team, the folks servicing Graham Rahal, have been better on pit lane than any other crew. We talked to two vital members of the team to find out how they get it done.

Once a pit lane speed limit was introduced to Formula 1 from the 1994 Monaco Grand Prix, Michael Schumacher was one of the first drivers that we at RACER can recall who really practiced maximizing his speed on pit entry, before crossing the pitlane speed limit line. With everyone conforming to the same speed when in pit lane proper, it was an obvious way to minimize time off the racing surface come race day.

These days, it’s almost de rigeur across multiple racing series to follow Schuey’s example and be up to speed on how to shed speed at the last possible moment without incurring a drive-through penalty. As Kyle Sagan, Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s pit stop manager explains, “We practice that every day we’re on track – test session, practice session, qualifying session, warm-up… We study data on that, and then also analyze videos of their entry into the pit box. Graham [Rahal] is our veteran on the team and is the best of our guys on pit lane: videos of him help our sophomore, Louis Foster, and our rookie Mick Schumacher, [yes, ironically, son of Mr. Pit Lane Perfection himself]. Great pit stops start with the driver.

“I was on Alex Palou’s car in 2023, and our No. 10 [Chip Ganassi Racing] crew would beat our teammates on Scott Dixon’s car, from stop to drop [from car coming to a halt to coming down off the jacks] but Scott would kill us on pit lane overall. So I hammer home to any driver, ‘You don’t have to come in with all wheels locked up to shave off half a tenth, but you must always hit your marks and be consistent, whether you have to drive in to your box around the car that’s pitted behind you, or whether you’re able to come straight in. That allows the crew to get used to how you arrive.”

Sagan, who moved from Arrow McLaren to Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing for 2026, is a difference-maker. Under his instruction, Rahal’s pit stops have been some of the finest in the NTT IndyCar Series this year. Not that Sagan will accept all the credit.
Paul Laguette illustration

“Graham has been with his crew for nine or ten years and it shows,” he says. “It used to be that you could do pit stop practice whenever you had time through the weekend. Now we have specific times, whether it’s the last 20 minutes of final practice or in race day warm-up, and we use that.

“Per IndyCar rules, the outside-front guy – often the crew chief – is standing up and signaling to our driver where we are, with the new outside front by his right foot. The outside rear tire is out there, too, but its changer isn’t there yet because the driver can’t run over the hose. The inside front and inside rear guys are poised – front guy crouched, rear guy standing – and waiting with their air guns, but their new tires are being held by crew members on this side the wall, ready to hand over the fresh tires and retrieve the old ones.
“As the driver stops – on his marks, hopefully! – the outside front tire and both inside guys can tackle their wheels simultaneously, as the jackman goes to the rear hydraulic jacking point to activate the car’s inbuilt jacks and the outside-rear guy runs around the back and removes his wheel, the refueler fits the hose and the tear-off person runs to clear the tear-off from the aero screen. That’s the only job that he or she is allowed to perform.

“The outside front guy, once his job is completed, throws the airgun back toward pit wall, lays the old wheel down and stands up. The outside-rear guy hands his wheel to the jackman who takes it while pausing at the jack to release it and lower the car, before taking the old outside rear back to the other side of the wall. The two inside wheel-changers have already handed off their old wheels back over the wall and if everything’s gone smoothly, they’re all signaling to the outside front guy that their job is done.

“If the car needs a full fuel load, that will decide the time of the stop, because I want the outside front and the two inside guys to be sub-4.75 seconds, and the outside rear to be sub-5.25s. From the car stopping to the fueler being fully plugged in should be six-tenths of a second, and then from completely empty to absolutely full tanks is 7.5s. The crew chief, on the outside front, is then the person who the driver looks at to signal when he’s free to leave the pitbox according to traffic.”

Front tire changers have to be adept at adjusting wing settings in qualifying and race, according to how a driver feels he needs to alter his car’s responses – often according to tire sets.
“On a road course, we have adjusters for the flaps on both sides ” says Sagan, “so each tire changer is responsible for his or her side. On the speedways, we have one adjuster on the nosecone. Then it’s the inside-front guy’s job unless he has an issue, and it’s the outside-front guy’s job to notice if his counterpart has an issue because then it might become his job.”

Flexibility is key for the crew, since they could find themselves in as many pit lanes going from left to right as from right to left.

Sagan states: “The way I’ve been explaining it – outside/inside rather than right/left – is the way it is in the team. The outside-rear tire changer is always the one running around the rear of the car, with his back to pit lane when tire-changing, whichever way pit lane goes, just as the outside-front changer is always the outside-front changer, waving the guy in and signaling him to leave.

“Ideally, he or she would be ambidextrous to carry out duties with left or right hands!”

 

Geoff Miller/Lumen via Getty Images


By David Malsher-Lopez - May 23, 2026, 12:23 PM ET

Perfecting an IndyCar pit stop the RLL way

THAT OUTSIDE-FRONT GUY’S VIEW

T.J. Thompson serves as Graham Rahal’s chief mechanic and, as per what seems like IndyCar etiquette, is also the No. 15 car’s outside front wheel-changer.

“I bring the outside front over the wall but I remain standing to wave Graham in,” he says. “When he’s about three pit boxes away, and they’re counting him down over the radio, that’s when I crouch down and get ready. We have a spring system on the wheelgun, and I pull a handle to put it into reverse to detach the wheelnut. When I release that handle, it automatically shuttles to going the other way, ready to tighten the new wheel on. So when I drop the gun and switch the tire, when I pick the gun back up, it’s already set to go the other way to attach the new wheel on. It’s been that way for the nine years I’ve been doing this.

“The wheel nut that comes off the car will stay in the gun magnetically, although if you’re not careful or a little rock gets in there, you can send it flying down pit lane because the gun is spinning at 18,000 rpm or something. So you keep a spare on a magnetic belt around your waist, and you have to make sure it’s the correct right- or left-hand thread nuts. So at say, Barber Motorsports Park or Indy, I’m on the right-front tire; at Long Beach or Indy road course, I’m left-front.”
TJ Thompson with Graham Rahal. RLL photo

Unlike Sagan’s “ideal”, Thompson is not ambidextrous.

“No I’m not – there are guys who are – but I’m right-handed,” he grins. “I’m right-handed and I always like to have the hose on my right. So when we’re going left-to-right on pitlane, I always like to have the hose come under my legs, so I have to get up and then throw the hose back toward the pit wall. When I’m on the right-front, the hose goes in the opposite direction so it’s not interfering with Graham’s exit from the pit box at all. And I’m only throwing it halfway to the pit wall – there’s someone the other side reeling it in.”

This isn’t the only position Thompson has held on the pit crew: before he moved to that oh-so-vulnerable position with his back to pit lane, he had that oh-so-vulnerable (for different reasons) position on the inside front…

“The standard development is that you’ll start on the inside-front, and then move to a different position. I think it’s because when you’re crouching close to pit wall, you have a tire helper on the other side of the wall to take the old one that you’ve just removed out of the way. It’s like the starter position for a pit crew member, because of that. The outside front person is out there by themself, they’ve got to throw the gun, and so on. The outside rear person obviously has to run around the rear of the car to get in position, and the inside rear person is getting crowded by the refueler and obviously has to deal with a bigger tire. So that’s why the inside-front is the ‘starter’ position in a pit crew.”

The outside-front pit member is the only crew member who has a tire left on pitlane when the car exits the pit box, and where he or she places it will define the driver’s trajectory, especially if everyone has pitted under a caution. That’s something that Thompson relishes because he’s a racer, who originally tried to work his way through the U.S. open-wheel junior ranks as a driver.
“I love it!” he declares. “You’re competing with the other pit crews, within your team and, more importantly, the other teams. That helps keep the edge, thinking, ‘I’m a part of the competition.’ That’s what I crave.”

And that time element? Of course, it’s hugely demanding, especially when the car is running well, as at Barber, where Graham Rahal finished third,

“Our outside-rear person should be getting his job done between 4.5 or 5 seconds. My goal is always four seconds. I can go faster than that – my personal best is 3.62. But my go-to is four, because then if something does go wrong, you’re not going to be at a five or a six.

“If it’s a ‘regular’ stop for a full fuel load, then the pressure is slightly reduced for the wheel-changers because the fuel is going to take 6.5-7 seconds. But you really feel the pressure if the field’s under caution because you know most cars are going to come down pitlane and that’s when you’re really competing against the other crews.”
Effective execution by the pit crew includes getting in and out of an often frenetic pit lane with minimal delays. Michael Levitt/Lumen via Getty Images

And then there is the major judgment call from Thompson and his equivalents on the outside fronts of each car as to when to send his driver out into the throng. There are inevitably some very close calls.
Thompson explains: “I get a lot of help from our people on the timing stand – in our case, Brian Barnhart, Graham’s strategist – because he’ll have a better view than me, plus I’ve just been changing the tire. Graham will have been looking in the mirror to check the fuel hose is fully disengaged, and then he looks to me for the signal. I won’t send him if there’s a car within a pit box distance already heading out and still in the slow lane.”

So what does T.J. think is the defining quality of a slick and quick crew that can earn the Firestone Pit Performance Award – in which the No. 15 team currently leads the standings?

“It’s all about cumulative time on pit lane, so having someone as experienced and sharp as Graham is a big help because it’s total time from pit-in to pit-out, so having him minimizing that time and being very accurate at stopping on his marks is great.

“And then having a good fueler who can get in the buckeye fast and pull out fast – reducing his time from 7 to 6.5 seconds, that’s also huge. The margins from the best stops to the 10th-best are usually just half a second, so a good fueler makes a massive difference.

“The other point that I think has made a difference for us is that we’ve kept the crew on the No. 15 the same as last year. Building that rapport so everyone is in-sync with each other has helped make us slick.”

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