Juncos Racing has today announced a few more details on the teams 2018 entry into the Verizon Indycar Series. The team entered the Indycar Series for the first time at the 2017 Indianapolis 500 running Sebastian Saavedra and Spencer Pigot on that occasion. The team has been a long-time competitor in the Mazda Road to Indy claiming the Indy Lights championship with Kyle Kaiser in 2017.
The step up to Indycar involves a one car programme with partial seasons for currently two drivers. One of those drivers is Kyle Kaiser. Kaiser is confirmed to race with Juncos at the Indianapolis Grand Prix and The Indianapolis 500 in addition to two to be determined championship rounds using the funding available from his Indy Lights title scholarship.
Today the has announced a second driver, namely Rene Binder will pilot the teams’ No.#32 entry during four additional races in the 2018 season to those previous announced for Kaiser. The events Binder is confirmed for are the season opener at St Petersburg, Barber Motorsports Park, Toronto and Mid-Ohio. The announcement therefore effectively means that the team is currently committed to competing in eight of the seventeen Indycar Series rounds during the 2018 season.
Austrian, Rene Binder has a background includes several seasons in GP2, before switching to World Series Formula V8 were he claimed 2nd overall in the 2017 season winning several races throughout the season and finishing the championship behind teammate Pietro Fittipaldi at the conclusion of the season.
Further announcements regarding Juncos plans for the remainder of the 2018 Verizon Indycar Series season will be determined based on what level of sponsorship can be attained for the team. Juncos has also yet to formally announce which engine supplier will power its 2018 season.
Hi Tom, Happy New Year.
Is this an additional team joining the series, or are they filling the place of a departing team?
A single car entry, and different drivers for different parts of the series, what a liberal idea!
Hi, Happy New Year to you too.
It is an additional team joining the series as are Carlin and Harding Racing but at the same time some of the existing teams have reduced the number of cars running so the net gain in terms of the number of actual cars running isn’t that great.
Still good news if its a net gain of teams and cars.
The cost of entry must be wayyyyyy less than for F1.
Do the teams run pay drivers for budget, or can they get sufficient budget from sponsors?
Yeah. The cost is far less than F1 but the prize fund, the sponsor dollars around the series and the number of eyeballs on Indycar is tiny by comparison to both American Open-Wheel in the 1990s and F1 as is the level of technology. The series runs a spec chassis although it isn’t an entirely spec series now. A few of the top drivers get paid to race but the vast majority of them bring a large amounts of money to a team, or in the form of a personal sponsor with them. Teams rarely get sufficient budget just from… Read more »
The latest to join the fray: One Jordan King of England (just irony, nothing else) to team up and share the car with Ed Carpenter. Both will be considered part-time drivers for their team.