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Another piece of the 2025 puzzle fell into place on Wednesday, when Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (RLL) announced they had signed the reigning Indy NXT champion, Louis Foster.

Marshall Pruett, or Racer.com, reported this as a multiyear contract on a fulltime ride for Foster, but you would never know it from the very cryptic press-release from RLL. They described it as multi-year, but there was nothing in the press-release to indicate this was fulltime. All it said about sponsorship was that those details would be released at a later date. There was also no mention as to what Foster’s car number would be.

Was the press-release cryptic by design, or was it just hastily written and lots of details were carelessly omitted?

We don’t know if Foster will be in the No. 45 that was vacated by Christian Lundgaard, or the No. 30 that was piloted by Pietro Fittipaldi. I’d say it is a safe assumption that Graham Rahal will remain in the No. 15 car.

I don’t think Fittipaldi blew anyone away with his performance, but my impression is if he can come up with the budget they want in the time frame they want – he will probably return to the No. 30 car. If not, it’s probably open to the highest bidder.

It’s probably a huge assumption, but let’s assume for now that Fittipaldi is returning to the No. 30 for next season, and Foster will go to the No. 45. Let’s also assume that Hy-Vee is returning to the team. That, too, could be a huge assumption. I’ve heard whispers that Hy-Vee really liked Santino Ferrucci, during that summer of 2021 when he drove the No. 45 in selected races. The whispers say they liked him so much, they might be moving to Foyt. I’ve also heard they might move to Ganassi or Penske; but I think if they are moving at all – Foyt is probably their most likely destination. On a side note, how bad of a look would it be if the owner of the series, poached a major sponsor from a smaller team to add to his own team?

For the purposes of this discussion, let’s assume that Hy-Vee is staying put at RLL. Do you think Hy-Vee would want to stay on the car driven by the promising rookie, or the veteran who hasn’t won a race since 2017. Graham Rahal will be 36 before the start of next season. At best, he is entering the backside of his career and is probably contemplating retirement within the next couple of seasons.

Lundgaard’s rookie year in 2022, was the only season when he did not outperform Rahal. That season, Rahal finished the season eleventh in points, while Lundgaard was fourteenth. In 2023, Rahal finished fifteenth, while Lundgaard finished eighth and won a race. This past season, Rahal finished eighteenth, while Lundgaard finished eleventh.

My first thought would be that Hy-Vee would want to be on the car for the primary driver on the team with the famous last name. But the No. 15 has been in a free-fall for the past three seasons. That car barely made the field for the Indianapolis 500 this past May and did miss it in 2023. Maybe it’s best to go with the promising rookie after all.

I am happy for Foster, and I’m glad to see that the Indy NXT champion gets a fulltime ride immediately after their championship season. Christian Rasmussen has landed nicely at Ed Carpenter Racing (ECR) after winning the 2023 Indy NXT championship, but it didn’t go as smoothly for Linus Lundqvist after winning the NXT championship in 2022. He didn’t drive his first IndyCar race until the next August after winning the championship. He drove for Chip Ganassi in 2024, but his plans for next season are definitely up in the air.

If I’m being honest, I was a little underwhelmed with Wednesday’s announcement. It was so vague and missing so many details, it left many questions. I think Louis Foster has talent, but he is a rookie. Expectations need to be tempered. So far, the lineup at RLL does not excite me. While I think Graham Rahal will be an excellent owner, his performance as of late is very unremarkable. Coupling an aging driver on the decline, with an unproven (at this level) rookie is not anything that has me excited for this once-proud team.

I was hoping that Alexander Rossi could go to RLL and give them a much-needed lift. Undoubtedly, it was their recent record in the Indianapolis 500 that scared him off. That was the one thing that ECR could give Rossi that RLL could not.

I have nothing against Pietro Fittipaldi as a person, but as a driver – he just hasn’t really shown me a lot. Rahal Letterman Lanigan needs to land a star, if Fittipaldi can’t raise the money for 2025. Who that is, I’m not sure. Lundgaard left, and Rossi and David Malukas signed elsewhere. Are there any potential stars left? Rinus VeeKay perhaps? At least he has won a race in this decade.

It’s hard to believe this team won the Indianapolis 500 just a little more than four years ago. It’s been an uphill battle since. But if RLL settles for another mediocre driver with a big budget (Sting Ray Robb or Devlin DeFrancesco, for example), I’m afraid RLL will sink deeper into oblivion. For all the work they have put in, Graham and Bobby Rahal deserve better than that.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on October 11, 2024 at 4:03 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.