Inside Line Extra: Biggest 2027 Story at Chip Ganassi Racing?

Note: This series gathers the Inside Line panel to discuss the major storyline surrounding each NTT INDYCAR SERIES team entering the 2027 season. An installment on each team will appear at INDYCAR.com on Fridays.

Curt Cavin: Isn’t it all about Alex Palou (photo, top) given all the change within the organization’s engineering department? I actually think the changes make for a fascinating watch as we take evaluating Palou and his domination to another level. I mean, if he has another season anything like the past two, well, his legacy is at an all-time level. Seeing him earn a fifth consecutive series championship would be mindboggling given the talent throughout the field and even within his own team, keeping in mind that other teams have reorganized in a bid to dethrone him and the No. 10 car.

Eric Smith: While Alex Palou’s pursuit of a record-setting fifth consecutive championship is undoubtedly a major storyline, I’m particularly interested in watching Christian Lundgaard (photo, above, left). He joins Chip Ganassi Racing after recording back-to-back top-five finishes in the championship standings with Arrow McLaren, yet finishing third last season wasn’t enough to secure his seat. How will Lundgaard approach his first season with Ganassi? Will he put too much pressure on himself trying to prove McLaren wrong, or will he settle into his new environment and let his performance speak for itself? The opening stretch of the schedule presents an interesting challenge. Two of the first three races take place on street circuits, where concrete walls leave little room for error and can quickly punish a driver who overdrives. The other is at Phoenix Raceway, an oval where McLaren had seemingly questioned whether Lundgaard could deliver the results expected of him. With Ganassi carrying championship aspirations, Lundgaard's transition will be one of the team's biggest storylines to watch. How he handles the opening races, particularly on tracks that will test both his patience and adaptability, could set the tone for his entire 2027 campaign.

Arni Sribhen: There’s been a lot of change at Chip Ganassi Racing in the offseason. Foundational team members may have departed, but when you add new additions to what remains at the team, the sum of the parts is plenty strong to keep the 18-time INDYCAR SERIES champions at the top of the heap. How long that takes is the key question for 2026. Start with the engineering stand and who will work with Alex Palou, Christian Lundgaard and Kyffin Simpson (photo, above) in 2027. If the drivers work with familiar faces, this could be a long honeymoon phase for the new arrivals. But a slow start to these new relationships could be a season-killer before May, and we all know. Chip Ganassi likes winners.

Paul Kelly: During CGR’s two biggest peaks as a team, there were two elite drivers pushing each other to the limit. I’m talking about Jimmy Vasser and Alex Zanardi in the mid-1990s and Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti in the late 2000s and early 2010s. That hasn’t happened in the last four seasons, as Alex Palou has laid waste to his teammates – and the rest of the NTT INDYCAR SERIES field. The closest any CGR teammate has come to Palou (photo, above) in the last four years was 78 points by Scott Dixon in 2023. Palou crushed Dixon by 259 and 300 points, respectively, in the last two seasons. Now that Dixon has left for Arrow McLaren, can team newcomer Christian Lundgaard return CGR to its days as a true two-headed monster that steamrolls the field? We will see, and the engineering and technical management changes at the team will make the unfolding of this storyline even more fascinating in 2027.