Runner-up finish another sign of Herta ‘reset,’ says Andretti’s Edwards

Colton Herta endured a couple of down years at Andretti Global where he placed an unrewarding 10th in the championship across 2022 and ’23. A return to his previous form living on or around the podium is how he’s started the new year, and with a look back to his IndyCar debut in 2019, Herta’s off to the best combined season-opening performances of his career.

The Californian opened his 2024 account in the No. 26 Honda with a fifth at St. Petersburg, a fourth at the non-points $1 Million Challenge at The Thermal Club, and with his fighting run to second on Sunday in Long Beach, Herta is the only driver in the series to improve finishing positions across the first three events.

“We talked about trying to hit the reset button,” Andretti COO Rob Edwards told RACER. “The second half of last year, there was just a lot of frustration about how things were going. I give him a huge amount of credit. He went away in the offseason to think about a lot of things, watch a lot of video and think about what he wanted to do. And he's come back stronger, reminding himself that he's meant to enjoy what he's doing. I think he is enjoying what he's doing.”

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Was the 24-year-old placing too much pressure on himself to perform?

“I think so,” Edwards said. “And I think he believes that everyone around him is 100 percent invested in his success after we made some changes to the team last year. If you're him, he's like, ‘How does this feel?’ Give him credit. He has bought into what we're doing and how we're tackling it.

“And he's worked his ass off over the offseason to get back to where we all know he can be. It’s a new maturity and a new work ethic. I just give him a huge amount of credit.”

At least through three races, Herta is displaying the kind of approach that leads to becoming a championship contender. He could have tried to lunge and attempt a high-risk pass on race leader and winner Scott Dixon, but chose to embrace the bigger championship picture and settled for second.

“He’s thinking about what he's doing, and he's a lot more mature,” Edwards reiterated. “It was one of the things we talked about in the strategy meeting today. It’s funny; we talked about it coming down to what we did have at the end there. We talked about the fact that, as a reminder, if you finished fourth or fifth in every race, you're going to be in the hunt. Once you lose points, you can't get them back. So it's important to get those points on the board.”