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Motorsport

Joey Barnes

Alexander Rossi ends “terrible year” with Laguna Seca IndyCar podium

Alexander Rossi IndyCar ECR Laguna Seca Ed Carpenter Racing Michael L Levitt Lumen Mid

Alexander Rossi secured his first podium since 2024, driving the #20 ECR Chevrolet to a third-place finish in the IndyCar season finale at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca.

Starting fourth and leading four laps, the performance marked the 34-year-old California native’s first podium with ECR – the same venue where he captured his last podium in his final season with Arrow McLaren.

The strong finish was a much-needed morale boost for a team that battled persistent misfortune all year, leaving Rossi 15th in the final championship standings, which equals his finish from a year ago.

"It's no secret that this has been a pretty terrible year for myself and the whole ECR team with the litany of issues, some out of our control, some in our control," Rossi said. "It was really everything. Anything that could go wrong really did go wrong from crashes to failures of gearboxes, hybrids, engines. Some struggles, being on fire in pit lane. Some lack of performance at some events. Anything that you can think of has happened to us across both cars. Just a really trying year."

Alexander Rossi, Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet (Photo by: Michael L. Levitt / Lumen via Getty Images)

Despite the mechanical failures and literal fires, Rossi praised the team's resilience.

"Ultimately road courses have been something that have been a pretty big challenge for us in the second half of this year. Really ever since the Indy GP, there's been a huge amount of emphasis and effort behind the scenes to kind of dig out of that hole. It's very difficult to do in this championship," he explained.

"Just really proud of the whole organization and everyone involved for kind of staying true to the course and fighting through a lot of adversity. As I said before, like, no one lost motivation or commitment to the end goal and I'm just really proud of that."

Alexander Rossi, Ed Carpenter Racing (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Rossi said the Laguna Seca result reflected progress ECR had made on road courses during the second half of the season.

"This was a step for us in performance, for sure, especially on the road courses,” Rossi said. “I think we had a test at Mid-Ohio where we started to uncover some shortcomings. The Mid-Ohio race we took a little bit of a step. Portland, a little bit of a step. Here was another decent step. There's two issues, two challenges: you have to identify the problem, then you have to figure out how to fix it. We were able to do that to a certain extent. Like, there's still more to come from what we know."

Looking ahead, Rossi views the podium as a vital springboard for the organization.

"This is a great result to kind of reward that effort, just rebuild the confidence in everyone that we're capable of doing this," he said. "It's a huge step in the right direction. Now we have a lot of time to really understand. It's been a huge stretch for everyone in the series this past five weeks. To really analyze and understand how it can be better will be useful coming into March. It's a good boost going into what's going to be a long off-season, but an important one, to make sure we execute a lot better and clean up a lot of our issues that we can control in 2027."

Alex Palou, Chip Ganassi Racing Honda, Alexander Rossi, Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet (Photo by: Michael L. Levitt / Motorsport Images via Getty Images)

Rossi also pointed to the additional resources available since Ted Gelov joined ECR’s ownership group ahead of the 2025 season that better allows them to compete against the sport's heavyweight teams.

"I think the team just knows now that it has the ability,” Rossi said. “If we feel we need something, we can go get it, right? But the teams that we're trying to close the gap to have had that advantage on this organization at ECR for a decade. Just because someone comes in and gives you the resources and tools to close that gap, the teams you're competing against don't stop developing either. You have to take bigger steps than they do. It's not a simple proposition."

Alexander Rossi, Ed Carpenter Racing (Photo by: Gavin Baker / Lumen via Getty Images)

Recognizing Gelov's wider impact on and off the track, Rossi added: "This championship has so many great drivers and teams and personnel, you don't just do that overnight. Ted is an amazing partner in the organization, as you see with all of his activation, with commercials he's doing to help promote the series. It's pretty amazing what Java House and Splenda are doing outside of the competition side.

"Inside the organization, everyone knows if we need something, we can go get it. It's a matter of, as I said before, continuing to develop and get better. It will come. It's a process."