Crunch day for Chadwick's 2025 IndyCar chances

It’s going to be one of the biggest and most exciting events in Jamie Chadwick’s career.

The Indy NXT race winner will test an Andretti Global IndyCar on Monday, a test which she says is likely to decide whether she races in the senior championship next year.

While IndyCar has produced many of motorsport’s biggest female success stories, it hasn’t had a female full-timer since Simona De Silvestro in 2013 (pictured below), and of course the pull for Chadwick to step up is strong.

“I’m aiming high, and then let's see how the next few months pan out,” Chadwick tells The Race IndyCar Podcast when asked about whether IndyCar graduation or staying in Indy NXT is most likely for 2025.

“Especially after the IndyCar test, aiming high to see what opportunities there might be in IndyCar, I'd love to have the chance to step up.

“Seeing how the test goes is the first kind of port of call.

“If that goes well, then, yeah, trying to see what opportunities there are. But it's tough, for everyone. There are very, very few seats.

“Realistically looking what might be the best options, I think [it] could be another year of Indy NXT, it could be a part-time programme [in IndyCar], but also looking at endurance racing as well.

“There's so many races and opportunities and things even over here in the States that I'm looking at.

“Hopefully we can kind of start to build together some plans over the next few months, but nothing can really be confirmed or anything like that.”

Chadwick faces a busy period as she'll head to another test in a top international category next month. She really does have a lot of options in terms of where to go next.

It’s tough to know how likely Chadwick’s chances of a 2025 IndyCar seat are.

On one hand, Chadwick is not in the top five drivers most teams are talking about. Her Indy NXT season was strong but still only good enough for seventh place and the top two in the championship - Louis Foster and Jacob Abel - are desperate to step up.

Foster, who was also in his second season of Indy NXT, won seven races and scored 639 points to Chadwick's 310, giving him a scholarship to compete in the Indianapolis 500 and another IndyCar race.

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With a new charter system coming into IndyCar forcing teams to max out at three cars, and with the mid-season hybrid introduction pushing costs up (which is being passed on to potential drivers), there are just not many seats, budget challenges and a lot of people ahead of Chadwick in the queue.

But on the other hand, if her test goes very well, Chadwick could leap up the order. And she has the potential to generate so much attention that it’s not a stretch to imagine someone - Andretti or otherwise - putting a package together to get Chadwick on the grid if what happens on Monday makes enough of an impact.

Unlike many Indy NXT graduates before her who have proven sub-par in IndyCar, she has won a race in the feeder series and she would be much higher in the championship had this year played out differently.

Chadwick's Indy NXT season

Obviously the win at Road America from pole was the big headline for Chadwick.

“I felt pretty beaten down last year,” Chadwick says, discussing what the win did for her.

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“I think it was a good thing, character building if nothing else. The win was, for sure, a big confidence boost.

“It showed the people I needed to show what we were capable of, which was one thing, but I think showing myself that was another big, big thing.

“It's what we set out to try and achieve at the beginning of the year. Whether that ever happens or not, is another thing. So I was just really happy I could finally get that result.”

Chadwick also had a very solid season in terms of qualifying, in the top six in eight of 14 races, including perhaps the most impressive, in the top three for three of the four oval races.

“I’ve really enjoyed it,” Chadwick adds on ovals making up four of the last five races.

“We've had really good cars on the ovals this year in Andretti, which has helped, for sure. But I think our qualifying performances have been really strong. We've been in top three on every oval [this interview was before Nashville, where Chadwick qualified seventh], which, going into this year I wouldn't probably have expected.

“So that's been really positive.

“The racing, the racecraft, has been something we need to work on a little bit, especially in the last couple I think we can look at where we can improve.”

Nashville was a good example of that where an ill-timed move passing a backmarker took her out of contention.

While Chadwick admits most of their pre-season goals have been achieved, she’s still her typically brutally honest and ruthlessly analytical self.

When put to her that her season could have been much different without so many early season issues, Chadwick gives a matter of fact answer including “everyone can say that, especially in Indy NXT”.

The results that got away

St Petersburg - 20th
Qualified 10th, hit by Josh Pierson to finish 20th

Barber - 20th
Qualified fifth, spun attempting an overtake at Turn 1

Indianapolis road course - 16th
Qualified sixth, ran fourth before a gear-shifting issue

Detroit - 12th
Qualified fourth, taken out by Yuven Sundaramoorthy

Gateway - 16th
Taken out by Collet in a frankly ridiculous incident

Portland - 14th
Pushed off on lap one, went off again solo later on

Nashville - 17th
Crashed out trying to overtake a lapped car

That feels a little too harsh as a fair few of the incidents she was caught up in were not Chadwick’s fault, and maybe if she’d have finished third to fifth in the championship and then making the step to IndyCar would be much easier.

“Realistically, we could have maybe been fighting for the top three of the championship if we'd been a bit more consistent,” Chadwick adds.

“So on the one side, very happy. On the other side, you want more. But I think that's how every season should look.”

What else is happening in Indy NXT

The big story of the 2024 off-season is that Chip Ganassi is joining the Indy NXT field with a two-car entry.

There was already a reset of the competitive order this year as Foster and Andretti ended a two-year run of titles for the HMD team, which ran almost 10 cars in the series at times.

HMD's new factory was opened in the second half of 2024 and with impressive rookie Caio Collet signed to stay on, he has to be the title favourite.

Ganassi and Andretti look set to fight it out for Indy NXT feeder series USF Pro 2000's champion Lochie Hughes (pictured above) of New Zealand, who beat 16-year-old sensation Nikita Johnson to that title this year. Johnson could race in Europe next season and will be a hot property.

NASCAR driver Hailie Deagan has also been investigating a potential switch to the series and Andretti and Ganassi would both likely be interested in her, too. Her profile might not be as big as Chadwick's globally, but in North America Deagan is very well known among racing fans.

Elsewhere, Abel Motorsport finished second with Jacob Abel this year and has signed Myles Rowe for his sophomore season.

Rowe is backed by Penske Entertainment's Race for Equality and Change initiative and the Force Indy team which has the aim of increasing diversity and representation in motorsport.

Rowe - who has been mentored by Will Power - was 11th with HMD this year after a good start to the season tailed off for the 2023 USF Pro 2000 champion.