This upcoming Sunday, May 25, Nolan Siegel will check off another accomplishment to his racing résumé: Compete in his first-ever Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The 20-year-old Siegel from Palo Alto, California, currently competes as a full-time NTT INDYCAR SERIES competitor in the No. 6 Dallara-Chevrolet entry for Arrow McLaren, an organization which he joined midway during the 2024 season.
In the early phases of the 2024 season, Siegel joined Dale Coyne Racing (DCR) as a part-time competitor for his inaugural presence in the IndyCar circuit. During his part-time stint with DCR, he endured a difficult moment a week prior to the 2024 Indy 500 when he was the lone competitor who failed to qualify for IndyCar’s prestigious event on the schedule.
Compared to last year, this season generated a different outcome for Siegel as the Californian managed to place his Arrow McLaren entry in the 24th-starting spot for this year’s 109th running of the Indy 500. As a result, he will be one of three rookie competitors competing in a first-ever Indy 500 event, a list that includes Louis Foster of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing and pole-sitter Robert Shwartzman of Prema Racing. A victory in this year’s Indy 500 would not only be the first for Siegel in his IndyCar career, but it would be the first since Alexander Rossi made the latest achievement in 2016.
Even in a career where he achieved the 2023 Indy NXT Rookie-of-the-Year title and won the 2024 24 Hours of Le Mans in the LMP2 class, Siegel rates the opportunity to compete in the Greatest Spectacle in Racing as a major feat of his career.
“[The Indy 500] has always been a dream of mine,” Siegel said. “To have a chance at another one of the triple crown races within a year of that Le Mans win is very special. I’m super excited, but being American, [I’ve been] an IndyCar fan since I was growing up racing go-karts, this has always been like the Holy Grail of racetracks and of races. I’m really, really excited to get a chance at it.”
As previously mentioned, Siegel was signed by Arrow McLaren on a multi-year basis, which began midway into the 2024 season and carries forth into the 2025 season and beyond. Driving the No. 6 entry for the remaining 10 events of the 2024 campaign, Siegel endured a roller coaster stretch, which was highlighted by the Californian notching his first top-10 career result by finishing seventh at World Wide Technology Raceway. Mired within the seventh-place result were two DNFs and six results outside the top-10 mark for an average-finishing result of 16.7. In addition, he qualified no higher than 11th twice.
Despite commencing his first official full-time campaign with Arrow McLaren by crashing out of the season-opening Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on the opening lap, he rallied three races later by making his first Firestone Fast 6 appearance at Barber Motorsports Park in early May and proceeded to finish in ninth place. With a 13th-place result during the most-recent Sonsio Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course event, he is currently ranked in 18th place in the 2025 driver’s standings and trails the points lead by 183 points.
“Coming in mid-season last year, that was a huge ask and a huge challenge,” Siegel said. “I feel like since then, having the off-season to work with everyone, put a good group together on the No. 6 car, we’ve made progress. That showed in the results in some places. We have a completely new group of people. Nobody’s worked together. New engineers, new mechanics. Young people that are really talented, but it just takes time for that to grow and I think that we’re going to continue to get better and better as we work together longer.”
Amid the steady improvements on the track, Siegel rates his overall assessment of IndyCar competition as a learning curve experience highlighted with a series of challenges week in and week off due to the high level of competitiveness. Nonetheless, he continues to strive forward with hopes of being a front-runner in the series for years to come.
“Being a rookie in INDYCAR is not easy,” Siegel said. “People have asked me what’s the biggest difference is from other things I’ve raced and the difference is just how competitive it is. You have to be nearly perfect all the time to be anywhere close to where you need to be here.”
Nolan Siegel’s first Indianapolis 500 career start is scheduled to occur this Sunday, May 25. The event’s pre-race coverage is slated to air at 10 a.m. ET on FOX and the drop of the green flag is slated to occur at 12:45 p.m. ET.
