2025 IndyCar season outlook: PREMA Racing

Yesterday at 12:20 PM

With the first practice session of the new IndyCar Season due to begin at St. Petersburg on Friday, it's time to start ramping up for the launch with a look inside each of the 11 teams.

What's new, what's different, and what has stayed the same? We'll find out from each team, continuing after Meyer Shank Racing with PREMA Racing.

2024 ACHIEVEMENTS

None. PREMA is the first new full-time team to join the IndyCar Series since 2018 when Carlin Racing launched its program (which shuttered after 2021).

PREMA is the only team allowed by IndyCar to compete as a non-charter entrant. Of the 11 teams and 27 full-timers, the 10 preexisting teams and their 25 entries were awarded charter contracts from Penske Entertainment which guarantees their participation in every race (barring the Indy 500 where all must qualify) and gives the 25 the right to try and earn one of Penske's $1.2 million Leaders Circle prize money payout contracts reserved the top 22 eligible finishers in the Entrants' championship.

As the only non-charter season-long team in the series, PREMA is not eligible to compete for Leader Circles. But IndyCar took PREMA into account while setting a new entry limit per race, capping all events (except the 33 at the Indy 500) at 27, thus guaranteeing PREMA's participation in every race (minus Indy) despite the lack of charters for both of its cars.

2025 DRIVERS

•  No. 83 Honda: Robert Shwartzman (rookie)
•  No. 90 Honda: Callum Ilott (took part in three events for Arrow McLaren in 2024)

2025 KEY POSITIONS

•  Team Founder: Angelo Rosin
•  Team Owners: Deborah Mayer, Rene Rosin
•  Team CEO: Piers Phillips
•  General Manager: Graham Quinn
•  Communications & Team Management: Angelina Ertsou
•  Technical Director: Guillaume Capietto
•  Sporting Advisor: Ryan Briscoe
•  No. 83 Race Engineer: Joao Ginete
•  No. 83 Race Strategist: Robert Gue
•  No. 83 Chief Mechanic: Dave Arnold
•  No. 90 Race Engineer: Steve Barker
•  No. 90 Race Strategist: Lorenzo Casiraghi
•  No. 90 Chief Mechanic: Ernest Bustamante

ITEMS OF INTEREST

•  Italy's PREMA is among the greatest European junior open-wheel teams, having played a considerable role in developing all manner of drivers who've raced in Formula 1 and other major series.
•  Becomes the second IndyCar team co-owned by a woman (joining Meyer Shank Racing's Mary Beth Shank).
•  The team is a solid blend of PREMA's European crew and new-to-them IndyCar veterans.
•  Signed two of its accomplished graduates in Callum Ilott and Robert Shwartzman.
•  Signed Ilott's former Juncos Hollinger Racing race engineer Steve Barker to pair with the Briton.
•  Signed Michael Cannon as its head of engineering in November.
•  Cannon left in a disagreement over his usage – or lack thereof – in January. A 12-month non-compete clause has reportedly been trimmed to six months, making Cannon available to work for another IndyCar team in June.
•  Signed ex-Juncos Hollinger driver Romain Grosjean as its reserve driver.
•  Grosjean has an out-clause that would allow him to race for another team if an opportunity were to arise.

THE MISSION AHEAD IS TO…

Show well and learn. PREMA's expertise is in road racing, and while some of its engineers bring solid oval experience from other teams, it has the most to learn at the Indy 500. Except for Nashville, the rest of the ovals are comparatively short and have traits that aren't wholly different from blasting through fast road course turns so it's not uncommon for inexperienced oval teams and drivers to show well on short ovals.

It's mostly the big ovals where immediate competitiveness is a struggle, so as a whole, PREMA should be rather solid at the majority of events during its debut season.

There's a lot of IndyCar experience within the program, and it also made the smart move to hire former Team Penske title contender Ryan Briscoe to be its version of Ganassi's Dario Franchitti and Penske's Rick Mears. Half of Briscoe's eight IndyCar wins came on ovals; he's also an Indy 500 polesitter, so his offerings to PREMA's drivers and engineers will be invaluable.

Carlin, the last prominent European junior open-wheel team to come across and take on IndyCar, made a few well-publicized mistakes while preparing for its first season. I don't foresee PREMA repeating those mistakes. There will be some weekends where PREMA stumbles around at the back of the field, but I expect more of the comments will be about how well they're performing with Ilott and Shwartzman.

And will there come a point where Ilott's being pushed by his rookie teammate to be PREMA's lead performer?

Yes, it's a new team to IndyCar, but look for PREMA to outrun some veteran outfits.

Shwartzman's Main Task: Enjoy his long-awaited return to open-wheel racing.

He was sidelined after nearly winning the F2 title and choosing to chase F1 opportunities that did little more than stall his open-wheel career. A turn to sports car racing kept him active while serving as Ferrari's reserve F1 driver, but he's getting a first chance to turn all he showed in F2 through 2021 into a prime opportunity in IndyCar.

Shwartzman is regarded as one of the great untapped talents to come out of F2 who should, based on talent alone, be sitting in a great F1 car. The Ganassi team, which rarely fawns over young talent, tested him a few years ago and wanted to sign him right away, but this was while he had F1 in his eyes.

That sign-him-now ambitions tells you what kind of potential they saw in him, and while he'll be learning almost every track for the first time, and how to race on ovals, Shwartzman is one of the highest caliber rookies we've received in many years. He will impress.

Ilott's Main Task: Be a leader. He was that guy for Juncos Hollinger on their return in 2021 while having to go through the same learn-everything process at Shwartzman, and now it's time to do it again with PREMA. Being an IndyCar mentor for Shwartzman will be somewhat new; he tried with former JHR teammate Agustin Canapino, but that relationship quickly soured.

His familiarity with Shwartzman – both were PREMA alumni before joining up in IndyCar – and the team's hierarchy should make this new-team experience far smoother than what he encountered at the frequently combustible JHR squad, and he also has a familiar race engineer to work with in Steve Barker. The two were quite good together at JHR under difficult circumstances.

With calmer waters, and a significant increase in budget and depth for this duo, the No. 90 car is a real sleeper pick for the season to do things a new team should not be capable of delivering. Ilott's also strong on ovals, as demonstrated during his last season with JHR.

GOALS

Angelina Ertsou, who runs the team with her partner Rene Rosin, is the perfect voice for this question.

"Every team is out there to win, and every driver is out there to win," Ertsou told RACER. "I don’t think there’s a single one out there, including ourselves, who aims for a P2 or P3. That’s quite clear. That said, from our perspective, this being our first year, we don’t want to set expectations in terms of numbers.

"For us, our main goal and expectation this year would be defined in one word, which is improvement. We want to start wherever we start, and we want to keep improving throughout the season. So of course, if we start in P20, we want to improve from there. If we start from P10, same thing. This is our way of seeing things, in terms of setting expectations."

MORE THOUGHTS FROM ANGELINA ERTSOU:

"We wanted to bring people from European backgrounds, but we also wanted to for them to be mixed up with people with experience in IndyCar," she said. "So we’re very happy we achieved that goal and we’re very happy with everyone who’s on board. Everybody’s working together really well, especially considering that this is a very brand new group of people.

"You know, it’s often very easy to have a historically bonded team and just bring on a few people here and there. And it’s very different to just bring people from all around the world and put them in together. So the process is clearly longer, because those people don’t know each other that well. So the first phase was to get to know each other, trust each other, work together.

"Those steps are fundamental, but clearly takes time. They say Rome wasn’t built in a day. So from that perspective, we’re really happy because it’s gone fairly well, all things considered."