IndyCar's season opener featured no fewer than 10 drivers making debuts either with new teams or in the series.
As they all prepare for round two at Thermal this weekend, we decided to grade their efforts so far as many went under the radar in St Petersburg, while in other cases their first races tell us plenty about what to expect this season in IndyCar.
Christian Lundgaard - A+
Move: Rahal to McLaren
Given he is a race winner already and has produced some spectacular performances in IndyCar, no one doubted Christian Lundgaard's potential to excel at McLaren.
That being said, racing for this extremely high-profile Formula 1-affiliated team brings pressure - and going into a team that has naturally gravitated around Pato O'Ward (who has left every team-mate in his wake) meant there was certainly intrigue about how Lundgaard would do.
Outqualifying all of the other McLaren cars in fifth (and he reckoned third was possible but he made a mistake in his last run) and an eighth-place race finish where he was on a nightmare strategy was just about as good as it could have got. He was a mid-race caution away from winning the thing.
"I kind of talked a little bit of a bigger game in the off-season, saying that I wanted to be competitive," Lundgaard told this week's edition of The Race IndyCar Podcast.
"And if you would have told me six months ago that I would have been the best-qualifying McLaren car and the highest-finishing McLaren car in the race, I would have shaken your hand and run away with my arms over my head.
"I think it just proved that we've done a really good job in the off-season as a group on the #7 car. I don't take anything for granted. Pato is going to be extremely strong throughout the season, and I'm aware of that, and we try to lean as much as we can on each other, to excel, the entire team."
Tune into this week's podcast for more from Lundgaard on his spectacular debut weekend in St Pete and what that means for the rest of the season.
Marcus Armstrong - C+
Move: Ganassi to Meyer Shank
Marcus Armstrong started life at Meyer Shank Racing by qualifying fourth, one spot behind team-mate Felix Rosenqvist.
The team was already quick in St Pete last year and Armstrong said it has been "impressive" how quickly Shank has adapted to five years of technical support from Andretti being replaced with a Ganassi tie-up.
The race was going well for Armstrong and he said he had "one of the strongest Sunday race cars that I've had in my IndyCar career", but ultimately he made a small mistake and brushed a wall which broke the suspension.
"It still hurts now," he said speaking to The Race last week.
He added: "We've got to make steps on how we go about the races. I feel like I've spoken to Mike [Shank] a lot about this, and Mike even told me himself, we've got to work on getting Sunday right, because at the moment and in the past, Saturday has always been a strength of the team, so we've got to start nailing the Sundays now."
Alexander Rossi A+
Move: McLaren to Carpenter
Alexander Rossi is box office for IndyCar. Is he an underperforming star destined not to reach his pre-2020 heights again? Or a mishandled talent not yet given the right car to shine in?
The way he started in St Petersburg with new team Ed Carpenter Racing suggests the latter. Even with a team in flux after a big off-season recruitment drive and with a car clearly weaker on street circuits than anywhere else, Rossi qualified 20th, but combined strong pace and good strategy to rise to 10th by the end.
"We're realistic in terms of knowing where our strengths and weaknesses are going to be as we start this journey and I think street courses are certainly not something that we're currently super confident about," Rossi told The Race.
"I think that there's some big improvements in the pipeline, but we don't really have a handle on how to apply those quite yet."
He added: "To come out of St Pete with a top 10, and recovering from not being on the preferred strategy, was an overall good day.
"The team was fantastic in pitlane, there were no errors in terms of nothing went wrong throughout the weekend.
"We made some good improvements on Sunday, and we executed the best we could and came away with a semi-decent result. So I think everyone was happy with that."
ECR should be much better on road courses and at the Indianapolis 500, so keep a close eye on its progress over the next few races.
David Malukas - C
Move: Meyer Shank to Foyt
AJ Foyt Racing's new signing David Malukas is only really marked down for his qualifying where, after not trying the soft tyres in practice, he delivered what he called "one of the worst drives I've done" to start 17th.
In the race he could have scored a top 10 only for a slow final pitstop that earned the #4 crew last in IndyCar's pitstop rankings.
He seemed a step ahead of one of the stars of 2024, Santino Ferrucci, but there's still plenty still to find out about this group.
Rinus VeeKay - A
Move: Carpenter to Coyne
Given the Dale Coyne team lost a lot of staff in the off-season, Rinus VeeKay's pace was very encouraging - qualifying 12th and finishing ninth. He also set the second-fastest lap of the race, and gave the team its best result since 2019 here. If this continues, he'll be leaping up rivals' driver market priorities no doubt...
"With time, we will get better," he promised, which is ominous for the opposition. Not bad for someone discarded by ECR at the last minute last season.
Callum Ilott - C, Robert Shwartzman - C+
Move: Returned to/joined series with Prema
You can read our full assessment of debutant team Prema's first IndyCar race here.
Robert Shwartzman was generally slower than team-mate Callum Ilott, but had no radio which was brutal for a rookie.
Ilott was better in the race but hampered by a tricky qualifying where he struggled to switch the soft tyres on and a hybrid change just before the session won't have helped.
Devlin DeFrancesco - B-
Move: Returned to series with Rahal
If you just looked at the results, you might think my grade is mad.
But Devlin DeFrancesco qualified 14th (he only bettered that four times in his previous IndyCar stint with Andretti over two years) and was running behind VeeKay (eventually 10th) and Marcus Ericsson (finished sixth) when he had a puncture causing an extra stop.
He had a great chance of a top 10 or at the very least, challenging to be the top Rahal car.
Jacob Abel - D-
Move: IndyCar debut with Coyne
Dale Coyne's rookie signing qualified second slowest, had the slowest fastest lap in the race, and his team-mate VeeKay managed a top 10 while he was the last finishing car in 23rd.
He did well to bring the car home without a scratch, but there's work to do in terms of pace.
Louis Foster - N/A
Move: IndyCar debut with Rahal
Indy NXT champion Louis Foster qualified 16th out of 27 and as the top rookie in the field comfortably, but was taken out in Will Power's shunt with Nolan Siegel on lap one.
Encouraging pace during the weekend prior to that.
