Marcus Ericsson remains without a contract to compete for Chip Ganassi Racing for the 2024 IndyCar season. Where will he end up next year?
While his contract situation has flown a bit under the radar due to the speculation surrounding the future Chip Ganassi Racing teammate and IndyCar championship leader Alex Palou, Marcus Ericsson remains without a deal to compete in 2024.
Details of his situation have emerged in recent months, with Ericsson making clear that he wants to be treated — and paid — like a top driver, while Chip Ganassi Racing would like him to continue to bring funding.
Where will the 2022 Indy 500 winner end up in 2024? Here are five possibilities.
Marcus Ericsson IndyCar landing spots: No. 1 – Chip Ganassi Racing
Marcus Ericsson is having an underrated season that has been overshadowed by the dominance of Alex Palou. Through 12 races, he sits in fourth place in the championship standings, and he has just two finishes outside of the top 10.
In addition to his season-opening win on the streets of St. Petersburg, he also came closer than anybody to winning back-to-back Indy 500s since Helio Castroneves pulled it off in 2001 and 2002.
Chip Ganassi Racing know Scott Dixon won’t be around forever. Even if they are able to retain Palou, whom many believe is off to McLaren following last year’s contract dispute, they would be smart to keep Ericsson, not just for the sake of keeping last year’s Indy 500 winner but for the sake of keeping him away from a rival team.
But if Ericsson can’t bring sponsorship amid rumors that longtime backer Finn Rausing will no longer be funding his entry and Chip Ganassi Racing aren’t able to give him what he wants, he could very well end up elsewhere.
Marcus Ericsson IndyCar landing spots: No. 2 – Arrow McLaren
It was undoubtedly a bit ironic to hear Zak Brown question Chip Ganassi Racing’s commitment to Marcus Ericsson, given how Ericsson competed for what is now known as Arrow McLaren before Brown and the McLaren team effectively took over the Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports team in 2020.
Nevertheless, three and a half years later, things have certainly changed, and Ericsson has gone from somewhat of an also-ran to a perennial championship contender who is capable of winning races at a variety of tracks.
Ericsson’s desire to be treated by a top driver is justified. He has won races in each of the last three seasons, he is an Indy 500 champion, and he came closer than anybody in the last two decades to winning the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing” in back-to-back years this past May.
The big question surrounding Arrow McLaren has to do with whether or not they will expand to four cars in 2024. It seems unlikely, given that they aren’t set to take over Andretti Autosport’s shop until 2025.
So if they sign Alex Palou, it would likely result in them cutting ties with Felix Rosenqvist for their third car. But even if signing Palou isn’t a sure thing, they could still move on from Rosenqvist, in which case they could slot Ericsson in alongside Pato O’Ward and Alexander Rossi.
Marcus Ericsson IndyCar landing spots: No. 3 – Andretti Autosport
Andretti Autosport have made a driver change after each of the last four seasons, and that streak is set to extend to five this offseason. Devlin DeFrancesco is undoubtedly in his final season behind the wheel of the No. 29 Honda for Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport.
The Andretti team’s sponsors and partners have recently made clear that they are willing to sacrifice a pay driver for one who is capable of earning good results.
There were even rumors of DeFrancesco being ousted before this year’s Indy 500. He has just three career finishes in the top half of the field and has never finished higher than 12th place.
Here’s an interesting statistic. The Steinbrenner car scored as many top 11 finishes in the 2020 season finale alone as it has in every race since. Read that twice. Marcus Ericsson, on the other hand, has a single finish lower than 11th place in the last 15 races and just two in the last 25.
Andretti Autosport obviously have a lot of confidence in the Road to Indy ladder, with Colton Herta and Kyle Kirkwood both being race winners whom the team can build around, and signing Ericsson wouldn’t necessarily be reflective of that approach.
But it wouldn’t necessarily contradict their overall approach either, given the fact that they signed Romain Grosjean last year.
Like Grosjean, who himself could still be replaced for 2024 (by Ericsson, perhaps?), Ericsson is a former Formula 1 driver, and he is a few years younger — with quite a bit more success in IndyCar since coming over to North America to his name.
What this team is currently lacking is stability. This is still a top-tier team with top-tier speed. What they don’t have is top-tier execution. If anybody can change that, it’s the driver who has been arguably the most consistent driver on the grid since securing his first career win on Belle Isle two years ago.
Marcus Ericsson IndyCar landing spots: No. 4 – Team Penske
It’s all fun and games with stalled contract talks until Roger Penske puts Marcus Ericsson in a fourth car and the (no longer) Sneaky Swede is drinking the milk for the second time, this time with the Captain congratulating him on delivering the team their 20th Baby Borg.
Team Penske quietly entered this year’s silly season looking like the only team that won’t make any waves, which is just the way they like it. Josef Newgarden, Scott McLaughlin, and Will Power are all under contract through at least 2024, and none of them are at risk of being released early like some others might be.
Of course, they also entered this year’s Indy 500 looking like a midfield team, and we saw how that played out.
Team Penske have run four cars full-time before, most recently in 2021 before they dropped the No. 22 Chevrolet that had been driven by Simon Pagenaud.
While going back to four cars might not be the most desirable option, Power is now 42 years old and won’t be around forever. Adding a fourth car under the assumption that they can again downsize to three when Power retires might be the way to go.
They took a similar approach in 2021 when they added a fourth car for McLaughlin. When Newgarden joined the team in 2017, he too was one of four full-time drivers.
With Ericsson available, this is an option they need to consider. All of a sudden, the team that entered this year’s Indy 500 wondering why they haven’t had any success at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in recent years could enter next May with the two most recent winners of the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing”.
Marcus Ericsson IndyCar landing spots: No. 5 – Ed Carpenter Racing
Ed Carpenter Racing know they haven’t been where they want to be over the last few years, and their decision to drop Conor Daly for the veteran Ryan Hunter-Reay not even halfway through the 2023 season shows that they are willing to take chances to make a long-awaited step forward.
Depending on how this team progresses throughout the remainder of the 2023 season with an IndyCar champion and Indy 500 winner behind the wheel of the No. 20 Chevrolet, Ed Carpenter Racing could be an attractive option for Marcus Ericsson next year.
Even as things stand right now with the team’s recent struggles across the calendar, what Ericsson would know for a fact that he can do with Ed Carpenter Racing is win the Indy 500 for a second time.
Rinus VeeKay just turned the second fastest four-lap front row average in Indy 500 history this past year and led laps for the third straight year. He has never qualified worse than fourth place in four Indy 500 starts, and he has now started on the front row for three straight years.
Team owner Ed Carpenter takes exception to the suggestion that his cars don’t race as well as they qualify at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and while the team’s results haven’t matched their qualifying performance, he is right to feel that way.
VeeKay would have been in contention for the win this year not for a pit road mishap, and Conor Daly, who recorded just three total top 10 finishes in three-plus seasons with the team, scored Indy 500 finishes of sixth and eighth place in 2022 and 2023.
Even joining an improved Ed Carpenter Racing might be a step down for Ericsson, but it might be his best bet to having another glass of milk.