Daly on the perks of a proper pre-season after “painful” IndyCar cameos

Conor Daly has been reaping the rewards of a proper pre-season programme for the 2025 IndyCar Series campaign after “painful” cameos in recent years.

The 33-year-old will contest the upcoming season full-time for Juncos Hollinger Racing, after undertaking partial campaigns for the last two years competing in 51 percent of the races.

Daly drove for six teams during that time meaning he was unable to fully integrate himself into a squad, affecting his ability to have a proper seat fitting or to set a car up to how he likes.

“My seat has been painful to be in,” said Daly. “But guess what, it costs money to make a seat and none of these teams that I’m going to jump in for one race are going to spend money to get me a seat.

“I can do something like that, which is very helpful. I can have my own steering wheel grips, that’s very nice.

“All those small things are… again, all of the people that are winning and contending, you have to have all those things because this is the most competitive championship right now and everything has to be perfect. Everything has to be right.

“Just doing all those things feels right. And just getting a little desk in the office – I’m going to get my own desk in the engineering office.

“I want to have a computer so I can finally be fully integrated in the team systems. All of those things are what you are supposed to do as a racing driver at the highest level.”

Daly made his IndyCar debut in 2013 and has scored two podiums in that time, one of which came last year for JHR finishing third in Milwaukee – a result he reckons proved crucial in getting a full-time drive for 2025.

“I think it’s the only reason why I’m here,” he added. “We showed a lot of speed in other places, but even the 10th place in Nashville that I thought was one of our best races in a long time, we qualified sixth, finished 10th, that’s not really what matters.

“You’ve got to get trophies. You’ve got to be doing stuff that makes people take a second look – a third look even.”

Daly will start his IndyCar campaign at the St Petersburg season-opener on the 2 March, as he looks to improve on his career-best finish of 17th in the championship.