25-car IndyCar fields looking likely to start 2026

Hopes have dimmed for the IndyCar Series to continue its trend of having at least 27 cars to open the season and run at capacity for the entirety of the championship.

The series reached 27 cars to launch the 2023 season, again in 2024, and continued with that number through 2025 where Penske Entertainment’s new charter system capped each race – barring the traditional 33 starters at the Indianapolis 500 – with grids of 27 cars.

PREMA Racing, which joined IndyCar last year, has been trying to find new ownership and take its place under a new name and maintain its place in the series with the 26th and 27th entries, but multiple sources have told RACER there’s no chance of PREMA being on the grid in March, when four races fill a frenetic opening month for the series.

Those sources all point to the fifth race of the season – the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach held across April 17-19 – as the first target for the team’s potential return. RACER understands months-long talks with potential investors continue to take place, but with the onset of the new season less than three weeks away and a relentless stretch of four events in five weekends from Feb. 27 through March 29, PREMA is set to miss nearly one-quarter of the races on the calendar.

Its absence means that unless one of IndyCar’s 10 veteran full-time teams, or a part-time entrants like Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, seeks permission from the series to field extra cars in March – or possibly for the entire season, which IndyCar President Doug Boles stated as a preference – fans will have a regular group of 25 cars to follow unless something positive develops with PREMA or another team to join the field.