Methodical racer Kellett takes aim at Indy 500
Stouffville driver one of two Canadians hoping to make mark in race Dalton Kellett qualified 24th in the 33-car field for the Indianapolis 500.
Dalton Kellett is a thinking man’s racing driver. No pedal-to-the-metal, get-outta-myway approach to this sport for him. Nope. He’s much more methodical.
That’s why some followers of auto racing, including me, suspect he might surprise a lot of people in Sunday’s running of the 104th Indianapolis 500. If his car — entered by A.J. Foyt Racing — holds up and his Chevy engine is tuned to run a marathon, Kellett could be up near the front of the 33-car field when the checkered flag waves at the end of the day.
Translation: in a sprint race, he likely wouldn’t do all that well against seat-of-the-pants racers. But make it a test of endurance, which 500 miles most definitely is, and a calm/ steady approach could prove to be the right way. Back in 2016, for instance, Alexander Rossi was the surprise winner of the 100th Indy because all the fast guys in front of him found themselves running out of fuel before the finish, which could have been a preview of the way Kellett plans to attack the race on Sunday.
The Stouffville driver qualified to start 24th, ahead of such celebrity drivers as threetime winner Helio Castroneves, two time F1 world champion Fernando Alonso and defending 500 champion Simon Pagenaud. Pretty good for a rookie in the NTT IndyCar Series.
He is one of two Canadians in the race, James Hinchcliffe of Oakville being the other. Hinchcliffe, a veteran who won the pole in 2016 for what’s billed as the Greatest Spectacle in Racing, will start sixth on Sunday.
Four items of interest before we get back to Kellett: this is the first time the 500 has not been held in May, the race will start at 2:30 instead of noon, there will be no women driving race cars (first time since 2000) and no spectators in the stands. Spooky. But it will still be the Indianapolis 500, the biggest, most famous and most important auto race in the world, even though Dalton Kellett came to it late. When he started racing
— he was a Johnny-come-lately at 14 — he wanted to drive in Formula One.
“Those were the Michael Schumacher days,” he said in an interview. “My dad and I would watch the F1 races. But once you see the realities of the racing world, especially as you get older, and the education thing with me became a big focus, going over to Europe to race and still go to university here seemed not as realistic. So the American open-wheel cars were more what I tilted toward. I got to know Indy and the history of the race and that’s when it became a focus.”
So in 2011, when he was 17, Kellett took up open-wheel racing with Brian Graham Racing in the Ontario Formula 1600 Championship (the same Graham who schooled American Conor Daly, who’s also driving in the 500 on Sunday).
“That was my introduction to single-seater racing,” Kellett said. “That was the summer I went to university (Queen’s University in Kingston, where he subsequently graduated with a degree in engineering physics) and then the next summer I started on the Road to Indy program in U.S. Formula 2000.”
He did a year of F2000, two years of Pro Mazda and then four years of Indy Lights (he won the pole for a Lights race at the Speedway in 2018) before opting to take a crack at the big time. “This is a big event for me,” he said. “This is my debut at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. I’m looking forward to it.”
I told him that I thought the 500 was the type of race in which he could succeed.
“This place and the oval mentality plays into my strengths because it is a methodical approach to preparing the race car,” he said.
“I think the reason we’ve done well at this track in the past (three third-place finishes there in Indy Lights) is because we’ve had this disciplined approach.”
I suggested to him that the list of people who’ve raced at Indianapolis is long, but not that long. It’s pretty special to get the opportunity to race in the 500.
“I am very excited to be doing this,” he said. “It is a huge moment in my racing career. I’ve been building up to this for many years. I know I sound calm and cool about this but beneath the surface I am very excited. This is a huge opportunity and I am so thankful.
“I’m really hoping I do Canada proud.”
Dalton Kellett’s a nice young guy who hasn’t let the notion or celebrity of Indianapolis go to his head. He wants to race and to do his best for his family and his country and we, as his fellow Canadians, can’t ask for anything more than that.