IndyCar: Are Carlin really as bad as they have seemed?

By Asher Fair | Mar 26, 2019

SONOMA, CA - SEPTEMBER 15: Max Chilton, driver of the #59 Carlin Chevrolet (Photo by Jonathan Moore/Getty Images) /

Since coming to IndyCar in the 2018 season, Carlin have been arguably the worst team on the grid. But are they really as bad as they have seemed?

Carlin made their IndyCar debut in the 2018 season by fielding two full-time entries, the #23 Chevrolet for Charlie Kimball and the #59 Chevrolet for Max Chilton, two drivers who were cut by Chip Ganassi Racing following the conclusion of the 2017 season.

Carlin’s first season in IndyCar was not all that strong. While Kimball recorded six top 10 finishes, including a fifth place finish in the race on the streets of Toronto, throughout the 17-race season, he only managed to finish in 17th in the championship standings, which was higher than only one non-Carlin driver (A.J. Foyt Enterprises rookie Matheus Leist).

Chilton, meanwhile, failed to finish a single race in the top 10 and ended up finishing in 19th place in the championship standings, which was the worst finish in the standings among the sport’s full-time drivers.

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A lot of this lack of success was chalked up to the fact that Carlin were the sport’s newest team as well as the fact that they were a Chevrolet-powered team. After all, to this day, a non-Team Penske Chevrolet team have not won an IndyCar race since Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon won the race at Watkins Glen International late in the 2016 season.

For the record, Chip Ganassi Racing are now a Honda-powered team, meaning that the most recent victory for a current non-Team Penske Chevrolet took place earlier in the 2016 season when Ed Carpenter Racing’s Josef Newgarden, who now drives for Team Penske, won the race at Iowa Speedway.

Meanwhile, since Newgarden’s victory in this race, Team Penske drivers have combined to earn a whopping 21 victories in 42 races.

However, are Carlin really as bad as they have seemed?

After Patricio O’Ward lost his full-time ride with Harding Steinbrenner Racing ahead of the 2019 season, which he had landed only days after the 2018 season ended, the 2018 Indy Lights champion signed a 13-race deal to drive the #31 Carlin Chevrolet throughout the 2019 season.

In his first race driving for Carlin, which was this past weekend’s race at Circuit of the Americas, the 2018 Indy Lights champion was a teammate to Max Chilton, who, unlike Kimball, is still driving for the team on a full-time basis this year (Kimball is now a part-time driver).

O’Ward, who was making only the second start of his IndyCar career, as he made his debut in the 2018 season finale at Sonoma Raceway driving for Harding Racing, qualified for this 60-lap race around the 20-turn, 3.41-mile (5.488-kilometer) Circuit of the Americas road course in Austin, Texas in eighth place. He went on to finish the race in a career-high eighth as well.

Chilton, meanwhile, finished the race in 21st place after qualifying in 13th.

Why is this significant? Because it illustrates the fact that Carlin may not really be as bad as they have seemed through their first one-plus season competing in IndyCar.

When it comes to assessing the team’s performance, it should go without saying that the results of Chilton and Kimball, who have driven in a combined 37 races for the team since the start of the 2018 season, should be taken with a grain of salt.

Chilton and Kimball are two drivers who drove for Chip Ganassi Racing, one of the sport’s top teams, for two seasons and seven seasons, respectively, and had a very limited amount of success during their time spent doing so.

In 33 races driving for Chip Ganassi Racing, Chilton did not earn any victories nor podium finishes. He earned only one top five finish and eight top 10 finishes during his two-year tenure driving for the team. He recorded a career-high fourth place finish in the 2017 Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway and a career-high 11th place finish in the championship standings in the 2017 season.

In 117 races driving for Chip Ganassi Racing, Kimball earned only one victory, six podium finishes, 13 top five finishes and 49 top 10 finishes. He earned his lone victory for the team in the race at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in the 2013 season.

Kimball finished in a career-high ninth place finish in the championship standings in the 2013 and 2016 seasons, which were the only two seasons that resulted in him finishing in the top 11 in the standings during his seven-year tenure driving for the team.

The fact that two drivers who struggled driving for Chip Ganassi Racing have had little to no success driving for Carlin should not be used as evidence to support the idea that they are a weak team. That said, it will certainly take more than one race for O’Ward at Carlin to see just how well he stacks up against Chilton and Kimball and thus how strong the team really are.

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I’m not saying that Carlin are secretly as good as Team Penske. However, Patricio O’Ward’s success in his first race driving for the team may very well have illustrated that the team are not really as bad as they have seemed and that they may deserve a lot more respect that they have gotten since joining IndyCar last year. Only time will tell for sure.