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On the last day of the calendar year in 2024, Arrow McLaren completed their takeover of Schmidt Peterson Motorsports (SPM) that started in August of 2019. This was initiated when McLaren decided to enter the NTT IndyCar Series full time. Rather than start a team from scratch, like Carlin, Juncos or PREMA – they decided to partner with an existing team.

After the bad blood that began between McLaren and Honda in Formula One, it spilled over into IndyCar. Honda made it very clear that they had no intention of ever doing business with McLaren ever again. They stuck to their guns. This meant that McLaren was limited to partnering with an existing Chevy team, or get a Honda team to switch their allegiance. They chose the latter and convinced Sam Schmidt and Ric Peterson to abandon their longtime relationship with Honda, so they could team with McLaren and their seemingly unlimited resources.

They parted ways with SPM’s driver tandem of James Hinchcliffe and Marcus Ericsson at the end of the 2019 season. It was uncertain if Hinch would even be allowed to drive in the season finale, after he appeared in some questionable photos for ESPN the Magazine. Even though Hinchcliffe made the grid for the finale at Laguna Seca, it was obvious that his services would no longer be needed at the newly revamped team.

I said at the time that this was no partnership. Sam Schmidt was insistent that it was still his team and McLaren was nothing more than a sponsor that was trying to sell their cars in the US. With the name of the team being changed from Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports to Arrow McLaren SP. To see the team-owner’s names reduced to two initials was telling. At the time, I think I predicted that McLaren would fully own the team before the start of the 2020 season.

Of course, COVID came along and we were lucky to get much of a season at all. Pato O’Ward and Oliver Askew were their new drivers. Before the shortened make-shift season was over, Askew had already been unceremoniously kicked to the curb. Other drivers have come and gone in similar fashion, but O’Ward has stayed and flourished at Arrow McLaren.

During the inaugural music City Grand Prix in 2021, it was announced that McLaren was purchasing 75% of the team. Somewhere in there, the initials “SP” were dropped. Team Executives like Taylor Kiehl and Gavin Ward came and left for a variety of reasons. A marketing alliance was formed between Arrow McLaren and Juncos Hollinger racing that was quickly dissolved by Zak Brown.

In the four and a half years since McLaren first got involved with Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, the public perception has gone from a small team that did things the right way that everyone rooted for; to a team that turned itself into an oversized bully that fans liked to root against.

It’s a shame, because there are drivers and former drivers that have hitched themselves with Arrow McLaren that I like, but I perceive their team to be a villain. It’s like O’Ward, Alexander Rossi, David Malukas and even Tony Kanaan have all crossed over to the dark side at some point. Rossi and Malukas are now elsewhere, but O’Ward and Kanaan remain.

Now we learn that Arrow McLaren has completed its buyout of Schmidt and Peterson, those two likeable owners are out. Sam Schmidt Motorsports has had an IndyCar presence since its founding in 2001, just fourteen months since the testing accident that left him a quadriplegic.

Schmidt wasn’t exactly a saint as a team-owner. He finagled FAZZT Racing away from Alex Tagliani in 2011 and I’m not sure Schmidt and Davey Hamilton parted amicably, after Hamilton brought HP sponsorship to the team and Schmidt managed to keep HP as a sponsor, after Hamilton’s departure. I’ve heard other tales of Schmidt getting the better end of deals over the years. Some say he was a shrewd businessman. Others have other terms for him I won’t mention here.

Whatever you think of Schmidt, he has been around as a driver and team-owner for almost thirty years. As of January 1, he has no involvement with IndyCar and I find that a bit sad. He, AJ Foyt and Dennis Reinbold are about the only ones left from those early IRL days. Those were not the best years for IndyCar, but it is still a part of the history of the sport and it’s sad to see the remaining few dwindle further.

Sam Schmidt has been through more than any of us would ever want to go through. I don’t know this, but I have an idea that him forming his own team barely a year after his tragic accident was a form of therapy. It kept him involved in the sport that he loved, yet took so much from him. Personally, I hope we have not seen the last of Sam Schmidt. He has a lasting legacy that his former team will do little to preserve.

George Phillips

On another note:  I just learned that one of the original readers and commenters on this site, Skip Free, passed away this morning (Jan 8) at the age of 71. Skip was a native Hoosier and a Purdue grad. He enjoyed rubbing it in to me whenever the Boilermakers would defeat the Vols in football and basketball. He also loved the Indianapolis 500, having been almost a charter member of the original Snake Pit in Turn One. He found this site in the early months and followed it regularly and commented often. I met Skip only once, during the Month of May around 2016 or so; but we corresponded regularly. In recent years, Skip had retired to Myrtle Beach, SC. On Dec 2, Skip was diagnosed with Stage-4 liver cancer. Although his prognosis was not good, he told me that his goal was to make one more 500. That will not be happening now. Please join Susan and me in offering prayers for his wife, Kathy, and their family. – GP

This entry was posted on January 8, 2025 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.