For the second year in a row, there are set to be 34 drivers going for 33 spots in the Indy 500, and as we have seen in the past, Indianapolis Motor Speedway plays no favorites.
Prior to this year, four of the last six Indy 500s have featured a Bump Day, and on three of those four occasions, a full-time driver has missed out on competing in the "Greatest Spectacle in Racing".
Who will miss out on this year's 200-lap race around the four-turn, 2.5-mile (4.023-kilometer) Speedway, Indiana oval?
1. Katherine Legge
Katherine Legge made an impressive return to the Indy 500 last year after a decade away, and she ended up being the highest qualifying driver of the four Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing drivers in what was a disastrous qualifying weekend for the team as a whole.
But now she is set to compete for Dale Coyne Racing with Rick Ware Racing, which fielded the only non-Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing car in last year's Bump Day session.
Legge has never qualified higher than 30th place in three Indy 500 starts, and Dale Coyne Racing don't appear to have a ton of upside heading into this year's race. Assuming Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing have made even slight improvements from a year ago, it will be an even bigger mountain to climb for Legge to make it into the race this year.
With no qualifying efforts higher than 30th and just 34 cars on this year's entry list, it's hard to not include her among the five most likely to be bumped.
2. Nolan Siegel
With Abel Motorsports not competing, Dale Coyne Racing have to be considered the team most likely to have one of their drivers miss out on this year's Indy 500, especially since it is believed that Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing won't be nearly as slow as they were a year ago.
Nolan Siegel did an impressive job at the Thermal Club, nearly qualifying for the 12-driver $1 Million Challenge in what was his first career IndyCar race. But in his official series debut in the points race at Long Beach, he qualified last.
It came as somewhat of a surprise when Dale Coyne Racing confirmed Siegel as the driver of the No. 18 Honda for the Indy 500, given the fact that he is set to enter race week with just one official IndyCar start to his name -- and the fact that Jack Harvey, the primary driver of the No. 18 Honda this season, was available.
Harvey also got valuable experience on Bump Day last year, bumping out then-teammate Graham Rahal after the clock hit triple zeroes with a run that nobody saw coming after his overall lack of pace earlier in the afternoon.
While Indy 500 practice week and qualifying weekend often throw us a few curveballs, it would not be surprising if the 33rd and final spot comes down to two teammates once again, this time at Dale Coyne Racing.
3. Sting Ray Robb
A.J. Foyt Enterprises brought pace to Indianapolis Motor Speedway last May that nobody could have anticipated, given the fact that they had struggled for so many years. Both Santino Ferrucci and rookie Benjamin Pedersen advanced to the second round of qualifying, with Ferrucci advancing to the third and qualifying on the inside of the second row in fourth place.
But even with an A.J. Foyt Enterprises team that have a technical alliance with Team Penske, I don't trust Sting Ray Robb to match or even come close to matching Ferrucci this year.
He has shown no signs of quality pace at any point throughout his first few races behind the wheel of the No. 41 Chevrolet, and he showed no signs of quality pace at any point during his rookie season on oval tracks. He neither started nor finished any oval race inside the top 20, and that includes races that featured nowhere near the 33 cars that the Indy 500 features.
Last year's Bump Day would have featured all four of the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing drivers instead of just three, had it not been for Robb's lack of pace on the first day of qualifying on Saturday.
Let's not forget that then-teammate David Malukas comfortably qualified for the race, even after looking like he too could be a Bump Day candidate early on. An inability to extract the pace out of his car this year could prove detrimental.
4. Pietro Fittipaldi
What happens if Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing haven't made the necessary improvements to their superspeedway pace and they end up once again fighting just to get all of their drivers into the race?
It's hard to see Graham Rahal missing out two years in a row, and Christian Lundgaard was the strongest of the group on Bump Day last year, placing him second of four within the team. And do we really think that two-time Indy 500 winner Takuma Sato, who won this race for the team in 2020, is going to be 34th of 34 drivers on qualifying weekend?
That leaves Pietro Fittipaldi, who has not competed in an IndyCar oval race since the 2021 Indy 500. Fittipaldi has been the slowest of the team's three drivers through the first few races of the 2024 season, and his lack of oval experience makes him the driver within the team most likely to be left on the outside looking in if they haven't figured things out at the "Racing Capital of the World".
Stranger things have happened, however, like Katherine Legge topping the entire four-car team in qualifying last year, despite having not competed in an IndyCar race in a decade at the time.
5. Kyffin Simpson
I struggled to pick a Chip Ganassi Racing driver as a top five possibility to miss the Indy 500, given the fact that the team have taken every pole position for the "Greatest Spectacle in Racing" since 2021, but rookie Kyffin Simpson is going to have his hands full on qualifying weekend in a five-car team where he is clearly the fifth driver.
Simpson has raced well through his first few IndyCar starts, gaining 11, seven, nine, and 10 spots from his starting positions in his first four starts. But his qualifying pace simply hasn't been there, as he has never outqualified more than four cars, nor has he started higher than row 12 in 23rd place.
Additionally, his pace in the April open test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway was not promising, even less so considering the fact that two of his teammates placed inside the top four and the other two placed inside the top 15.
Despite running 80 laps, tied for the most among all 34 participants, he finished the day 33rd on the speed chart, ahead of only Dreyer & Reinbold Racing's Ryan Hunter-Reay -- and mechanical and electrical issues were what prevented the 2014 Indy 500 winner from running more than seven laps.
Chip Ganassi Racing always field fast race cars throughout the month of May, but the decision to promote Simpson to IndyCar this season and to add a car to do so was and continues to be questioned. A DNQ for IndyCar's top team would only add to those questions.
That said, if he can simply get into the race, look for him to find a way forward, just as he has in every race of his IndyCar career thus far.
Indy 500 qualifying is scheduled to take place on Saturday, May 18 and Sunday, May 19. The race itself is set to be broadcast live on NBC from Indianapolis Motor Speedway beginning at 11:00 a.m. ET on Sunday, May 26. Start a free trial of FuboTV and don't miss it!