Land of the Rising Son? IndyCar’s Next Japanese Driver
For the past couple of seasons, a question has been lingering on my mind: When is Honda going to drop a hint regarding their next Japanese driver, to challenge IndyCar’s bumpy street courses, road courses, short ovals, and superspeedways? Seeing as Sato’s tenure can’t last forever, would it make sense for, and behoove, Honda to identify and begin grooming his replacement?
The silence, in this regard, seems to stem from a couple of factors.
Loyalty. I’m not sure Honda would allude to any change in their IndyCar roster, since their modus apperandi may be complete loyalty to their current driver, until said driver retires. And until Sato retires, we may only hear of another driver, after Sato has made an official announcement, whether on his own volition, or at Honda’s behest. That said, I’m not sure that Honda wouldn’t be averse to having multiple Japanese drivers in the IndyCar series, at the same time. Which leads me to consider the following…
Disinterest. I haven’t heard of any Honda Japanese drivers expressing interest in IndyCar. I recently had a conversation with @geinou on Twitter, who is a hardcore fan of SuperFormula, as well as Japanese drivers, in general. He mentioned three names in conjunction with F1 and IndyCar: Fukuzumi, Makino and Matsushita. All three are gunning for Formula 1, but he seemed to believe any of the three drivers could thrive in IndyCar. Question is, would they want to live in the U.S. and compete in IndyCar, when they have SuperFormula and SuperGT in Japan?
I also had a conversation with a Japanese journalist at IndyCar’s Phoenix test, this past February, and he seemed to believe Honda was leaning more toward IndyCar for their drivers, since most of their F1 hopefuls weren’t performing up to the level they’d desired. To illustrate this point, Makino and Fukuzumi are sitting at P18/P19 in the FIA F2 standings, and Matsushita and Fukuzumi have yet to score a championship point in Super Formula, and are sitting at P14/P20.
Results matter, and the only Honda driver currently sitting atop any standings in any major series is a 29 year old driver by the name of Naoki Yamamoto, who is currently P1 in both Super Formula and SuperGT, in Japan. Last year, he was teammates with Pierre Gasly, and in a recent article on Motorsport.com indicated that racing with Gasly forced him to overcome his narrow focus on winning and, instead, broaden his focus on more than one aspect of racing. In the end, he says, “I got to know [Pierre’s] strengths and learned a lot from him.”
This season, he is teammates with Jenson Button in SuperGT. I can’t think of a more advantageous teammate to have, to learn from, and to emulate.
While only three races into the current season, with five races remaining in each series, Yamamoto, nonetheless, seems to have learned from Gasly, has an opportunity to learn from one of the best, and has placed himself in a positive position to generate momentum for the remainder of the season.
I’ll leave you with this question. If Wickens and/or Rossi eventually jump ship to Penske, would Honda not have a golden opportunity to promote a hungry driver, like Yamamoto, to IndyCar? My hope would be that Yamamoto continues on this positive trajectory, and eventually embraces the Indianapolis 500, and all that Indycar, and the U.S. have to offer.
