The Dallara IR-18 used in the Verizon IndyCar Series has been nominated by British racing magazine Autosport as “Racing Car of the Year.”

With nearly 5,000 on-track passes during the 2018 season, it’s easy to see why the 2018 car with its sleek, bolder universal aero kit that created less downforce and drag was popular with the drivers and the fans of the series.

Autosport said in its nomination: “The manufacturer aero kits were gone, and the revamped IndyCar Series contender proved a hit both visually and on the racetrack. Hell, they could even overtake on road courses this season.”

Record passing numbers were set at St. Petersburg, ISM Raceway, Road America, Iowa and Gateway. But the proof of why the car merits consideration lies in the reviews from the drivers who worked with the car week in and week out.

Voting for the award is open to Autosport subscribers online at awardsvoting.autosport.com. The award will be presented in December.

MARIO ANDRETTI

"This thing is beautiful as it is. It's just going back to what the pure open-wheel, single-seater should be."

SCOTT DIXON

“I think the Verizon IndyCar Series has done a fantastic job with the aero kit. It looks fantastic. The car works well, raced extremely well at St. Pete. I think we saw a ton of passes and overtaking situations, which I think will run through for the rest of the year. So everything is good. Everything is positive.”

WILL POWER

“The car itself is a lot of fun to drive. You've really got to drive it and hang it out there to be quick It was actually good racing at times, and you can get close to people. It is a good car to race. … You don’t get a draft, but you can almost get right behind them. They did a good job of making the new (universal) kit with almost zero tow, so it makes the racing better I think.”

ALEXANDER ROSSI

“I think that this car, you can really play with the limits of it, which is nice for us. It allows us to kind of over-extend a little bit and still be able to reel it back in without a huge consequence, which is nice. It's a lot of fun.

That's just a huge hats off to Jay and the competition department of INDYCAR. It's not an easy task to come up with a solution that kind of hits all of the targets, and I think that they came as close to perfection as possible with this car.”

GRAHAM RAHAL

“These cars are far more demanding than anything we’ve driven; not demanding in the sense that it’s harder to get the speed out, it’s just easier to mess up. The window of opportunity, the margin is just very, very, very, very slim. … We’re all just still figuring this thing out. It’s going to take some time, but this was the first of many great ones for this car.”