Callum Ilott is back in IndyCar. The ex-Ferrari Formula 1 junior and former Alfa Romeo test and development driver has signed as Prema Racing's first ever IndyCar driver ahead of the 2025 season.
Ilott raced for Juncos Hollinger Racing between 2021 and 2023, where he managed a front-row start in 2022 and achieved two top-five finishes in his most recent full campaign in IndyCar last year before what felt like an acrimonious split at the end of the year.
This year he is racing a Porsche 963 Hypercar in the World Endurance Championship and won the Spa 6 Hours with the Jota team. He will now get a chance to continue in IndyCar, after a handful of appearances racing for Arrow McLaren as a substitute for the injured David Malukas early in 2024.
Here's why Ilott is a superb first signing for Prema, his history with that team, and what an in-depth look at his two and a half years in IndyCar previously can tell us.
Ilott's Prema history
Ilott raced for the team in 2017, aged 18, where he scored six wins and 11 podiums in European Formula 3 - which was then the top, FIA-backed F3-level championship.
He finished fourth that year - with Lando Norris taking the title - and also contested the Macau Grand Prix before moving to GP3 with ART Grand Prix.
Ilott has kept in touch with Prema and is well-liked by the team. So when it announced it was expanding into IndyCar, Ilott was always a strong candidate to fill a seat.
Prema is yet to announce his car number.
Ilott in IndyCar
Ilott finished second to Mick Schumacher in the 2020 Formula 2 championship and was unable to make the step up to a Formula 1 race seat.
Ricardo Juncos is a known watcher of international talent and once it was confirmed his team would return to IndyCar for select races in 2021 ahead of a full-time effort in 2022, Ilott was the obvious choice.
The team did not have a technical partnership and, short of buying some equipment and data from the outgoing Carlin team, everything was started from scratch.
Juncos was also the only full-time, single-car entrant in 2022, so Ilott scoring a pair of top 10s and a front row at Laguna Seca felt like a big step for the team.
A team-mate came in for 2023, Agustin Canapino, and while he did well for someone who raced touring cars in Argentina before, he wasn't the experienced team-mate that might have pushed Ilott on. And adding a second car in its second season really stretched a Juncos team that wasn't at that point staffed to make a really good go of a two-car effort.
The year featured strong results at the start in St Petersburg and at the end at Laguna Seca but, in between, it was a rollercoaster. Three races in, Ilott was sent death threats by fans after he was deemed to have held up Canapino, even though it later became clear Ilott wasn't to blame.
Then at the Indianapolis 500 he struggled to convince the team his car was ill-handling as it wasn't clear in the data. A last-minute switch to a back-up car proved Ilott correct and he not only improved his practice speeds massively but then finished 12th in the race itself, the team's best finish to date in the Indy 500.
More abuse from fans after a run-in with Canapino at the last race provided a sombre end to the year, and by the time Ilott left the team, there were few other seats available and he was sportscar racing's gain instead.
Why he's an excellent signing
Of course, Ilott having raced for Prema in Europe and having a close relationship with the team's owners is a help for both him and the team. But that's not the only reason it is right to have signed him.
Given what he had to contend with in his time at Juncos, he was more ready for a step up to a bigger and more established team than a hasty exit from the series, and that was proven by McLaren calling him up for St Petersburg and the Indy 500 this year.
His Indy 500 in particular was phenomenal. He had to go to the back at the start because the weight-jacker that controls the anti-roll bar had jammed, and he had to drive with it like that for the whole race and still finished 11th.
He also finished 11th in St Petersburg, which means he has the 10th-best average finish in IndyCar this season, despite being ultra-cautious to ensure he simply reached the end of races.
McLaren may have (originally) elected to sign Theo Pourchaire over Ilott for the remainder of 2024, but it would have been harder to extricate Ilott from his WEC deal. And Pourchaire only lasted just over a month before McLaren decided Nolan Siegel was a better option anyway.
If we address his 2023 Indy 500 in more detail, at that stage Ilott was fighting for his IndyCar career with Juncos, and merely keeping quiet and just driving the car might have been a more conservative option for not 'rocking the boat'.
But he insisted something was wrong with the car and, despite the chances of upsetting those around him, stuck to his convictions and called for a change. That in itself takes guts, especially when you're a driver not bringing budget to the table and relying purely on the team being happy with you to keep you on.
It's that knowledge, experience and self-trust that will help Prema, which is basically doing exactly what Juncos did in terms of coming into the series without a technical partnership and building from the ground up. Ilott's one of the few people Prema had available to sign who has done that before.
His oval performances outside of the Indy 500 were excellent for most of 2023, too. He held the ninth-best average finish until he crashed trying to avoid the slowing Takuma Sato at Gateway in the last oval race of the season.
He was also the best driver in the series in improving on his starting spot that year.
Ilott should never have been allowed to leave IndyCar and he definitely has unfinished business.
What Ilott and Prema have said
Ilott called the move an "amazing chance".
"I love the racing, I love these cars and I love the team, so it’s great to be back to what they call the Italian family home," he added.
“It’s going to be something special to build off, a lot of hard work but I’m excited to join the team and see what we can do together.”
Prema's IndyCar CEO Piers Phillips said Ilott will be a "key asset as we try to merge the team’s European heritage with what it will be able to learn in the US".
"We had a great time working with him in Formula 3, and we always kept an eye on him after that," added Prema owner Rene Rosin. "He proved to be a great fit for us in the past, and I think he will feel like picking up something he had left off."
