IndyCar: Ed Carpenter addresses retirement rumor

By Asher Fair | Nov 20, 2019

FORT WORTH, TEXAS - JUNE 07: Ed Carpenter of the United States, driver of the #20 Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet, stands on the grid during US Concrete Qualifying Day for the NTT IndyCar Series - DXC Technology 600 at Texas Motor Speedway on June 07, 2019 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images) /

Ed Carpenter addressed the rumor that he will be retiring from IndyCar competition this year and confirmed that he will be back for the 2020 season.

Ed Carpenter Racing have been in news quite a bit as of late, having just confirmed that Spencer Pigot will not return to the team in the 2020 IndyCar season after spending four seasons there, including the last two as the driver of the #21 Chevrolet. Rinus VeeKay has been tipped as his replacement, but nothing has been confirmed.

Their #20 Chevrolet also has a seat available for the road and street course races, as Ed Jones is not expected to return to the team in that role next year.

In fact, since team owner Ed Carpenter began driving the #20 Chevrolet in the oval races only, the same driver hasn’t driven the #20 Chevrolet in the road and street course races for two consecutive full seasons.

Pigot came closest, doing so for much of the 2016 season and the entire 2017 season before he was promoted to the driver of the #21 Chevrolet ahead of the 2018 season as the replacement for J.R. Hildebrand.

There had even been rumors that team owner Carpenter himself would retire and leave the #20 Chevrolet for another driver in the oval races or perhaps simply hire two full-time drivers instead of the usual one.

But he crushed that rumor with one blow, confirming a return next year. Here is what he had to say, according to Motorsport.

"“Yes, I will be continuing as oval driver in the #20 Chevy next season. It’s amazing: every year someone starts a rumor or predicts that I’m retiring, but that’s absolutely not the case.”"

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The 2020 season is set to be Carpenter’s seventh consecutive season driving the #20 Chevrolet for his team in the oval races on the schedule, and next year’s 17-race schedule features five oval races at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Texas Motor Speedway, Richmond Raceway, Iowa Speedway and World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway.

Prior to the 2014 season, Carpenter spent two seasons driving full-time for his team, but his results in the oval races trumped his resulted in the road and street course races, just as they did when he competed full-time in the series for Vision Racing from 2005 to 2009.

In 11 oval races in the 2012 and 2013 seasons, he secured one victory at Auto Club Speedway, one second place finish at the same track, two other fourth place finishes and four other top 10 results with just one finish outside of the top 14 and an average finish of 8.45.

In 23 road and street course races during the same span, his best finish was 12th place on the streets of Belle Isle, and his average finish was 19.00.

Carpenter has competed in 34 oval races since the 2014 season. He won at Texas Motor Speedway in the 2014 season, but he hasn’t been back to victory lane since, although he finished in second place by just 0.0399 seconds to Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing’s Takuma Sato at Gateway this past season. He also finished in second in the 2018 Indianapolis 500.

Carpenter’s stint as his team’s oval specialist has been littered with unfortunate DNFs, many of them not of his own doing. He has finished just 21 of these 34 races. He has recorded four podium finishes, four top five finishes and 14 top 10 finishes in these 21 races and has only finished below the top 13 on one occasion.

Prior to the 2012 season, his lone victory since he began competing in IndyCar in 2003 came at Kentucky Speedway in the 2011 season.

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The opening oval race on the 2020 IndyCar schedule and thus Ed Carpenter’s scheduled first start of the year is the 104th running of the Indianapolis 500. NBC is set to broadcast this race live from Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana beginning at 11:00 a.m. ET on Sunday, May 24.