IndyCar: Five questions we have ahead of the 2023 season

The gloomy skies and cold weather of January are still present around the majority of the nation, but race fans know that within a few months, the sun will peep out once again and the grass will grow green.

Yup, it might not feel like it just yet -- albeit the overall racing season kicks off this weekend with the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona -- but IndyCar racing is right around the corner.

In fact, pre-season testing takes place next week on February 2-3 at the Thermal Club circuit just outside of Palm Springs, CA.

Roughly one month later, the first race of the season will take place on March 5 on the streets of St. Petersburg, FL.

Like with any new season, many questions will be awaited to be answered. Here are five questions we have ahead of the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series season:

Will Jack Harvey have a full-time ride by the season’s end?

No driver will need to perform more in 2023 than Jack Harvey. After a disastrous 2022 season, Harvey must improve his performance quickly this year or ultimately find himself without a ride.

After finishing 12th overall in the 2021 standings for Meyer Shank Racing, Harvey -- who left a lucrative offer to remain with MSR -- finished a dismal 22nd overall in his first season with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing last year.

He had only one top-10 finish last season, coming at Nashville, and was regularly outpaced by teammates Graham Rahal and rookie Christian Lundgaard.

Harvey and Lundgaard will swap car numbers this season, and the Hy-Vee sponsorship will move to Lundgaard’s car as well. It has been rumored -- and would not be surprising, if true -- that the Midwest supermarket chain, which spent a small fortune promoting Harvey and IndyCar last season, was not pleased with the British driver’s dismal performance last year.

Without a doubt, Harvey will be on the hot seat all season - if he makes it to the end of the season, that is.

Will Jimmie Johnson run "the Double?"

One of the biggest stories of the offseason was Jimmie Johnson’s retirement from full-time racing.

But that doesn’t mean we won’t ever see the seven-time NASCAR champ in a race car anymore. In fact, Johnson announced in November that he will return to part-time Cup Series competition this year with the newly renamed Legacy Motor Club - a team he now also has an ownership stake in.

However, it is yet to be seen if Johnson will run any IndyCar races this season. He certainly has expressed running the Indy 500/Coca-Cola 600 "Double". Doing so would only add to an already impressive racing resume.

Whether or not Johnson does run the Double - or any other IndyCar races on a part-time basis - is yet to be seen. Johnson’s 2023 NASCAR duties have yet to be revealed besides the Daytona 500, so a few IndyCar starts aren’t out of the question. But Johnson’s former Chip Ganassi Racing ride will have new occupants this season.

Former Formula 2 driver Marcus Armstrong will drive Johnson’s old ride on all road and street courses this year, with another driver yet to be announced running the oval rounds. If Johnson were to return for the 500, it would have to be in a one-off entry with either Ganassi or another team.

Time will ultimately tell if Johnson will run the Double in 2023, but it would sure be an exciting sight to see if such plans materialize.

Will Romain Grosjean finally get his first win?

It’s been a long time since Romain Grosjean won a professional auto race: 12 years, in fact.

The Swiss-French driver’s last open-wheel race win came in a GP2 (now Formula 2) event in Hungary in 2011. Since then, he has spent nine seasons in Formula One and two in IndyCar.

Grosjean made his IndyCar debut in 2021 with the underfunded Dale Coyne Racing, where he scored three podium finishes and a pole position at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.

As a result, he was signed by Andretti Autosport in 2022 to replace the outgoing Ryan Hunter-Reay. Grosjean looked to build on the success of 2021 with the new team, but the 2022 season was a disappointing one for him as he scored just one podium and had multiple run-ins with other drivers on the track, including then-teammate Alexander Rossi.

Grosjean will likely be happy to hit the reset button this year. But the question remains of if he can finally reach Victory Lane in IndyCar competition.

In addition to his IndyCar duties this year, Grosjean will also drive for Lamborghini Iron Lynx in both FIA World Endurance Championship and IMSA SportsCar Championship competition this year.

How will Alexander Rossi fare with McLaren?

If you would have told a young Alexander Rossi eight or ten years ago that he would eventually drive for McLaren, he’d probably assume you were referring to the Formula One team.

However, Rossi’s F1 ambitions did not come to fruition, and instead, he moved to IndyCar in 2016 where he won the Indy 500 as a rookie and seven more races with Andretti Autosport.

Now, after two winless seasons with Andretti in 2020 and 2021 and a lone victory with the team last season, Rossi has moved on to what he hopes are greener pastures with McLaren’s IndyCar team.

Rossi is ready for a change of scenery and it could possibly not come at a better time. While the Andretti team has struggled to remain a legitimate championship contender over the last few seasons, the growing McLaren team has emerged as one.

Rossi’s new teammate, Pato O’Ward, has proven to be a title contender himself, winning four times over the last two years and finishing third overall in the 2021 standings (dipped to seventh in 2022).

“What they've accomplished in a short period of time speaks for itself,” Rossi said. ”The result they had (in 2021) was a huge amount of respect for Pato, obviously, but he's still new to the championship, and relatively young. The results he had were phenomenal.

“I think this is a team that is going to be a championship challenger. They already were last year. They will be this year. I certainly think it will be the case going forward.”

With confident words like those, it should be fair to say Rossi expects a return to championship contention for himself as well this year.

Can Jamie Chadwick win in Indy NXT?

The 2023 Indy NXT (rebranded from its previous Indy Lights moniker) will feature something it has not had in 13 years: a female driver.

And said driver will make her debut with more fanfare than any other NXT driver has received in quite a long time.

Twenty-four-year-old British driver Jamie Chadwick won everything there was to win in the all-female W Series. With 11 wins and three championships, she is the most successful driver in series history.

She now sets her sights on American open-wheel racing, where she will drive the No. 28 entry for Andretti Autosport.

Not only will Chadwicks’ presence in Indy NXT add a flair of diversity to the developmental series, it will also bring much-needed attention to it.

Chadwick is well-known among race fans globally due to the W Series’ international schedule. She will also be sponsored by DHL - the international logistics company that sponsors Andretti’s IndyCar entry driven by Romain Grosjean.

If Chadwick finds success in Indy NXT, she’ll certainly have earned it. The once-struggling developmental series was barely chugging along with less than 10 full-time entries just a few years ago. Now the series has at least confirmed 16 full-timers for the 2023 season with more entrants still in the realm of possibility.