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With Alexander Rossi moving over to Ed Carpenter Racing (ECR) next season, there is another driver that is now on the market seeking a new home for Rinus VeeKay.There were already more available drivers than there are available seats for 2025, and things just got a little more crowded.

VeeKay joins a field of confirmed drivers looking for a 2025 ride, as well as others whose plans for next year are still unsettled. If a driver doesn’t have a signed deal for next year, you have to say they are on the market – until they’re not. Although nothing has been announced for Kyffin Simpson, most seem to thing he is staying at Ganassi. Few other non-confirmed drivers have that security.

The list of currently available drivers includes Linus Lundqvist, Conor Daly, Theo Pourchaire, Romain Grosjean, Pietro Fittipaldi, Sting Ray Robb, Jack Harvey and Toby Sowery, And those are just drivers who drove this past season. You can also include Devlin DeFrancesco, who did not turn a wheel in 2024 but wants to have another opportunity. Plus he has cash to bring to the table. The same also goes for Benjamin Pedersen

Not all drivers have cash. A few have some, but others can only bring their helmet to the team. You can put Rinus VeeKay in that category.

My question is since Rinus VeeKay is one of the drivers that brings no money, will he be in a car for 2025?

Although he has little or no money to bring, VeeKay has one thing that none of the other drivers have – a race win. VeeKay won an impressive victory at the IMS road course in 2021, early in his second year in the series and his second year with ECR. He followed that up two weeks later with an eighth place in the Indianapolis 500 and then finished second at Belle Isle. The future looked extremely bright for the then-twenty year-old Dutch driver.

But like David Malukas earlier this year, VeeKay had an accident while riding a mountain bike following the Belle Isle race, during an off-weekend for the series. He broke his collarbone and missed the next race at Road America. In my opinion, he was never the same again.

For the remainder of that year, after such a promising start – VeeKay finished 16th, 24th, 24th, 21st, 17th, 18th and 25th. When you’ve embarrassed yourself by suffering a very avoidable injury, those finishes are not how you redeem yourself. He finished twelfth in points for the season.

In his five seasons at ECR, Rinus VeeKay never finished higher than twelfth, but never lower than fourteenth. The question is – was the driver the problem or was it the team?

It’s no secret that ECR had some plenty lean years in the past decade, especially on non-ovals. For three and a half seasons, veteran driver Conor Daly was his VeeKay’s teammate. Yet, in that time there was only a handful of races that Daly outperformed his younger teammate. Daly was relieved of his driving duties midway through the 2023 season, in favor of former IndyCar and Indianapolis 500 champion Ryan Hunter-Reay. Hunter-Reay did no better, so it’s obvious that it was the team and/or car more than the driver.

But it’s also no secret that when Rinus VeeKay was given a good car for the Indianapolis 500 – he often had brain-fades causing him to either tear up a good car (2022) or throw way a good finish by doing something foolish (2020, 2023, 2024).

Early in his career, a lot was explained away by noting his age when he started (19) and blaming it on immaturity. The problem is, VeeKay is now 24 and he is still making silly mistakes that either tear up equipment, or take him out of the running for a good finish.

There is no question that VeeKay is quick, but there is also no question that he has repeatedly made mistakes on the track. Now, any car owner will tell you that they would much rather have to hold back a driver who is naturally quick, instead of lighting a fire underneath a driver to get more speed out of them. But there comes a time when drivers grow tired of seeing (and paying for) the same mistakes over and over. I wonder if Rinus VeeKay has reached that point. (Photo: George Phillips – IMS 2024)

Of the available drivers out there, Rinus VeeKay may be the fastest and the most talented. But he may also create more carnage that any of those other drivers.

With two open seats at Rahal Letterman Lanigan, two at Coyne and (possibly) two at Juncos Hollinger – the opportunities are starting to dwindle down, especially for drivers that aren’t bringing budget. It is almost certain that both seats at Coyne will require budget. One at Rahal is most likely a paying ride, and if Grosjean does not return to Juncos – that may be a paid gig. But their other two cars will definitely require budget. Most seem to think that Grosjean will return to Juncos, so that means that the No. 45 at Rahal is the only paid ride still available – and that’s if Hy-Vee returns.

Personally, I like Rinus VeeKay and I hope he is able to put something together for a fulltime ride for next season. I’ve never met him personally, but he seems like a really good guy by all accounts. But his one IndyCar win is becoming a distant memory. Will that be enough to make him stand out among the other good drivers vying for seats for next season? I’m not so sure.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on October 4, 2024 at 4:02 am and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.