With Rossi’s arrival at Arrow McLaren, the team has expanded to three full-time entries, with a fourth for the Indianapolis 500 to be driven by Tony Kanaan. The former Andretti Autosport driver will also take over the #7 entry formerly driven by Rosenqvist, with the Swede switching to the new #6 entry and Pato O’Ward remaining onboard the #5.
Rosenqvist arrived at the team at the end of 2020, after a mixed bag of results at Chip Ganassi Racing. He impressed everyone in 2019 when he earned sixth in the championship, beat Colton Herta to Rookie of the Year honors, was barely beaten by teammate Scott Dixon to victory at Mid-Ohio, claimed another runner-up finish at Portland, and took pole for the Grand Prix of Indianapolis.
Into 2020, Rosenqvist scored his first win at Road America, defeating O’Ward but he would score only one more top-five finish that year, and ultimately finished outside the Top 10 in the standings.
What should have been a morale-boosting move to Arrow McLaren for ’21 saw Rosenqvist initially caught flat-footed by the uniquely extreme “on-the-nose” setups run by the team that year, and a huge crash at Detroit – while seemingly on course for at least a podium – put him out of action for two races.
However, soon after his return, the team allowed Craig Hampson and Blair Perschbacher to plow a slightly different furrow when it came to setting up the cars, and there was a notable uptick in Rosenqvist’s performances.
His fortunes remained poor however. He took two pole positions in 2022, but a dragging brake in the August race on the Indianapolis road course, and an engine detonation at Mid-Ohio may both have cost him wins, so that his third place at Toronto was his sole podium finish of the year. However, he finished eighth in the championship, one place behind teammate O’Ward, but one ahead of incoming teammate Rossi.
Although Rosenqvist loses Hampson to Rossi for 2023, Arrow McLaren has promoted from within for a replacement, and it’s the team’s former simulation engineer Chris Lawrence who will become the 31-year-old’s closest ally on the #6 pitstand.
