The number 3 is the number of the day for racing veteran and team owner Ed Carpenter, who will be piloting the No. 33 Ed Carpenter Racing Dallara-Chevrolet in all oval events in this year’s NTT IndyCar Series season.
Carpenter, a Butler University graduate who was born in Paris, Illinois, but grew up in Indianapolis, will be making his first IndyCar oval start of the season at Texas Motor Speedway on March 20. He will then return to Indianapolis Motor Speedway to qualify for the 106th running of the Indianapolis 500 scheduled for May 29, which will mark his 19th consecutive appearance in motorsports’ greatest spectacle event, before participating in an Iowa Speedway doubleheader feature on July 23 and 24. He will then cap off his racing tenure at Gateway’s World Wide Technology Group on August 20.
The team took to social media to reveal Carpenter’s racing plans on March 3 (3/3) at 3:33 p.m. (E.T.) with the date marking Carpenter’s birthday as he turned 40 years of age.
The 2022 season will mark Carpenter’s 20th consecutive season in IndyCar competition. Since making his debut at Chicagoland Speedway in September 2003 through his latest start at World Wide Technology Raceway in August 2021, Carpenter has notched three career victories, four poles, nine podiums and an average-finishing result of 14.3 in 191 career starts. His first IndyCar victory occurred at Kentucky Speedway in October 2011 followed by Auto Club Speedway in September 2012 and at Texas Motor Speedway in June 2014. Three of his four career poles occurred at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the Indianapolis 500, with his latest occurring in May 2018 as he went on to finish in second place. His best result in an IndyCar standings is 12th place in 2009.
Following a full-time IndyCar season in 2013, Carpenter scaled back to compete only on the oval venues from 2014 through the present. This season will mark Carpenter’s first sporting a new number after spending the previous 10 seasons piloting the No. 20 entry.
Carpenter’s team, Ed Carpenter Racing, currently fields two full-time entries. Conor Daly, who is coming off a 21st-place run at the Streets of St. Petersburg to commence the 2022 IndyCar season, is driving the No. 20 Chevrolet while Rinus VeeKay, who finished sixth at the Streets of St. Petersburg, pilots the No. 21 Chevrolet.
Carpenter is set to make his first NTT IndyCar Series start of the season at Texas Motor Speedway on March 20 with the event scheduled for coverage at 12:30 p.m. ET on NBC.
