{"id":177281,"date":"2026-03-04T03:59:26","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T03:59:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/177281\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T03:59:26","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T03:59:26","slug":"indycar-series-season-roars-to-life-in-downtown-st-pete-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/177281\/","title":{"rendered":"IndyCar Series season roars to life in downtown St. Pete"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Brief<\/p>\n

The 2026 IndyCar Series season kicked off in downtown St. Petersburg on a 1.8-mile, 14-turn street circuit that runs through city streets and along Albert Whitted Airport.<\/p>\n

Drivers like Santino Ferrucci say survival and a strong start are key to building early-season momentum in the championship race.<\/p>\n

Team owners emphasize that success depends not just on the driver, but on dedicated crews, engineers and strategists working together behind the scenes.<\/p>\n

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – It\u2019s a big day in St. Petersburg<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“I\u2019m just super excited,” IndyCar driver Santino Ferrucci said.<\/p>\n

The backstory<\/p>\n

The first day of the 2026 IndyCar racing season\u00a0kicked off Saturday in downtown St. Pete, and everything was\u00a0left out on the track.<\/p>\n

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READ: Man dies after early morning altercation in Seffner: HCSO<\/a><\/p>\n

“I just woke up, ton of energy this morning, ready to go. It’s one of those things to where you’re really excited to kick off the season, especially in a great place like here in Florida, so yeah, excited to see what we can do today,” Ferrucci said.<\/p>\n

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“They’re all anxious,” Kim Green, co-owner of Green Savoree Racing Promotions, said. “They want to do well. They want [to] start their season well. If they can launch this weekend and today well for the start of their race season. It’s a good steppingstone to get going for the championship.”<\/p>\n

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Drivers from around the world and even here in the Bay Area, are giving it their all on the 1.8-mile,14-turn circuit<\/a>. \u00a0Taking drivers through the downtown streets and even along a section of runway at Albert Whitted Airport.<\/p>\n

The energy was high from the fans and the drivers.<\/p>\n

What they’re saying<\/p>\n

“It’s just about survival,” Ferrucci said. “So if we can survive today and just kind of get through it, we’re going to have a good result. And that’s going to be monumental for us to go through the first few races here in March.”<\/p>\n

Even the owners\u00a0of the racing <\/a>teams had high energy.<\/p>\n

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“It\u2019s about people. You’ve got to have the right people. The driver, for sure, super important. Then all the crew that go around and prepare the race cars, do the pit stops, the engineers that help work on the setup of the car and the strategy. It takes a really, really good team. And you’ve really got to be dedicated,” Green said.<\/p>\n

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No matter who takes first in the race, the momentum that\u2019s built is what can make or break the racing season.<\/p>\n

“For a race like today, I’m just more excited than anything else,” Ferrucci said.<\/p>\n

“I think if you can win in St Pete, you’re in the right position to really start building points for the championship,” Green said.<\/p>\n

The Source<\/p>\n

Information for this article was gathered through interviews with drivers and owners involved in the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Brief The 2026 IndyCar Series season kicked off in downtown St. Petersburg on a 1.8-mile, 14-turn street…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":177282,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[37866,71382,17222,16090,83802,81083,202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-177281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-albert-whitted-airport","tag-city-streets","tag-downtown-st-petersburg","tag-indycar","tag-kim-green","tag-santino-ferrucci","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/177282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}