Armstrong ready for Tour de France on steroids
After being named IndyCar Rookie of the Year on a part-time schedule, Marcus Armstrong will drive ovals for the first time this year — starting at the Indy 500 in May.
“I’m really jumping in at the deep end but I wouldn’t have it any other way,” the 23-year-old told the Weekend Herald.
That will see three Kiwi drivers line up at the banner event, with Chip Ganassi teammate Scott Dixon and Team Penske’s Scott McLaughlin.
Armstrong has done some testing on oval circuits but admits driving laps in testing compared with a race would be very different.
However, he has had the benefit of being able to pick the brain of Dixon, who has had plenty of success on oval tracks and is a past Indy 500 winner.
“Ovals are something he’s been one of the best at for a lot of years, so it’s always nice to have him as a reference, but I’m going to have to experience it myself and find out what it feels like,” Armstrong said. “You can only prepare so much, you need to go out there and feel it and understand what to do differently.
“The speed is not something that has ever scared me, frankly, but it’s the way the car feels that is quite different than usual — all the tyres being on the same camber angle more or less, the weight and cross-weight, the suspension stiffness — it’s all very asymmetric, so that feels quite different to what I’m used to on a street circuit or road course.
“Getting used to that and racing — it’s like the Tour de France on steroids, just constantly slipstreaming and being strategic.”
Armstrong was hopeful of contesting some of the oval races in the second half of the 2023 season but was instead tasked with focusing on the street and road circuits, allowing him to get to grips with the new setting after spending his career in Europe.
His consistency saw him fly to the top of the rookie rankings despite running a shorter schedule.
“I want to go out there and win races, I’m not trying to sit back and just take points to win the rookie championship.
“You can only win it once, so it’s nice to get it, but at the beginning of the season, it wasn’t really my primary target.
“Also, we were doing five less races than the other rookies considering we weren’t doing the ovals. Under normal circumstances, you wouldn’t be able to win it with five less races. But considering we did quite a decent job gathering points and having quite consistent results, in the end, it fell our way. So I’m very grateful to the team because they gave me a car to do it with our limited races.”