Santino Ferrucci will enter the Indianapolis 500 with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, making a lineup of drivers who took three of the highest 4 spots in final yr’s race.

Ferrucci will drive the No. 45 Honda at Indianapolis with sponsorship from Hy-Vee. The Midwestern grocery store chain will even be the first sponsor in two IndyCar races this season for Graham Rahal and an affiliate sponsor on Rahal’s automobile your entire yr.

Takuma Sato gained the Indy 500 final yr for RLL and Rahal completed third. Ferrucci completed fourth driving for Dale Coyne w/Vasser-Sullivan.

“They’re positively making an attempt to stack the deck,” Ferrucci mentioned of RLL’s lineup for the one hundred and fifth operating of “The Biggest Spectacle in Racing” on Could 30. “I do not assume they might have constructed a greater driver lineup and that is in all probability the very best alternative I’ve had at Indianapolis.”

Ferrucci joined the IndyCar Collection with 4 races remaining within the 2018 schedule and ran the final two full seasons. He was the Indy 500 rookie of the yr in 2019 with a seventh-place end and trailed solely the RLL automobiles and runner-up Scott Dixon in final yr’s race.

Sponsorship woes led Ferrucci to discover a transfer to NASCAR this season and he is to date run 4 Xfinity Collection races with upstart Sam Hunt Racing. He was scheduled to race Friday night time at Martinsville Speedway however will as an alternative take part within the open check at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Thursday and Friday.

His subsequent Xfinity Collection race will probably be in June at Pocono Raceway, which supplies Ferrucci the following six weeks to arrange for the Indy 500.

“That was my dedication to Rahal, to be 100% dedicated and totally targeted on the Indy 500,” Ferrucci mentioned.

Ferrucci refused to shut the door on IndyCar as he started the transition to NASCAR and has labored all offseason to place collectively at minimal a journey for the Indy 500. He would add extra IndyCar races to his schedule if the chance was offered, and he is at the moment hoping for at the least 5 extra Xfinity races after Pocono in June.

His greatest end in NASCAR was thirteenth at Las Vegas, adopted by a pair of Fifteenth-place finishes at Phoenix and Atlanta. The IndyCar season doesn’t start till April 18 and there are simply two oval races — each at Texas Motor Speedway — earlier than the Indy 500 on Memorial Day weekend.

“I really feel like I’ve virtually bought a leg up in numerous methods as a result of my main focus to begin this yr has been nothing however ovals,” Ferrucci mentioned. “Regardless that it is a fully completely different class and kind of racing and actually a special a lifestyle, I’ve simply been so targeted on engaged on my driving type and skillset for ovals. I feel I am truly going to be in actually fine condition for the five hundred.”