May is well and truly here, and so is IndyCar's tradition of having its biggest race in the middle of its season - with the Indianapolis 500 dominating the month.
It's the race the teams want to win more than the championship, it's by far the most-watched event in the championship and it's where reputations can be raised or destroyed. Silly season also usually kicks off at this time.
So, with that in mind, The Race has picked out some of the teams and drivers to watch, what you need to look for during the practice and qualifying week, when everything is happening and some of the records being chased at this year's event.
Palou's chance to enter GOAT debate
He might win a fourth title before he's even started 100 IndyCar races, so there's not anything to prove here!
But Alex Palou's next step to join the absolute greats of IndyCar is, without a doubt, adding an Indy 500 victory. He's made no secret he needs to win this race in his career, and he discussed what it might be like in this week's episode of The Race IndyCar Podcast.
He came extremely close and reckoned he could have won if he had more experience when he was bested late on by Helio Castroneves in 2021, and in 2023 he was smashed into a wall by Rinus VeeKay in the pits.
Despite his difficulty getting a victory over the line on ovals generally, the 500 has easily been the scene of Palou's best turning-left-only performances in his IndyCar career, and, boy, would a 500 win send the Palou hype into cataclysmic overdrive.
Marcus Ericsson's big chance (and Andretti's)
Time and again, Andretti has come close to ending a barren run stretching back to 2017 at the Indy 500, but it can't keep squandering chances when its car is good.
Last year Marcus Ericsson crashed what he felt was a victory-contending car in practice and Colton Herta crashed out of third after having one of the best-looking cars all month.
The team has had no shortage of opportunities in recent years - don't forget also that an Andretti-affiliated car won in 2021 with Meyer Shank - and it's done one of the hardest parts in delivering strong cars every year. It's time for everyone to actually execute when that opportunity is there.
Ericsson especially had a rough first year at Andretti in '24, and he's still been the third driver in the team as far as the results go this year. If there's any race he can win, it's this one where he could have easily been a back-to-back double winner had a single caution gone a different way.
It feels he could prove some people wrong, as could the whole team as it looks to show that Michael Andretti stepping back from his team owner role can be the start of a new, exciting chapter for Andretti, not just the sorry end to a great story.
'Fighting for a championship' - but best finish of 11th
Santino Ferrucci's claim that AJ Foyt could challenge for a championship this year has basically been rebuffed already after four races, but he and the team are usually strong at the Indy 500, success at which would overwrite any standings disappointment.
David Malukas has shown signs of being a good 500 driver, too, so if the car is good Foyt should be having both cars in or around the top 10.
Without Michael Cannon as technical director this year, it will be fascinating to see if Foyt can maintain its stellar recent performances at the event via its technical tie-up with Team Penske.
Can a fallen giant recover?
After winning the race in 2020 and coming relatively close in 2021 before a wheel came off in the pits for Graham Rahal, the Rahal Letterman Lanigan squad has suffered setback after setback at the 500 and even failed to get Rahal into the 2023 event on Bump Day.
Its recent open test was a rollercoaster, as rookie Louis Foster estimated he had the third-best qualifying simulation of the test, but last year's shining light for Rahal - Takuma Sato - crashed heavily.
RLL has been working for years now to claw back the speed its rivals have found since 2020. The test showed signs it will be closer to a performance more fitting of the name on the door.
Speaking of rookies…
It goes without saying that Foster - and/or the other rookies in the event, Robert Shwartzman and Jacob Abel - could ensure a longer or more impressive future in IndyCar with a strong month.
For Shwartzman it's Prema's first 500 so expectations are extremely low, especially after Cannon departed the team pre-season. For Abel, his Dale Coyne team has slipped in recent years and he's had a tough start to 2025.
His team-mate will be an intriguing watch as VeeKay has just cracked the top 10 in the points. He's been strong at the 500, especially in qualifying, but that was with Ed Carpenter Racing - so now he has a chance to show it wasn't just the team that was quick.
VeeKay's replacement at ECR - Alexander Rossi - has had an even better start to the season and given how rapid ECR's car usually is at the Speedway, he's many people's pick for a top five and shot at victory.
Driving team boss? NASCAR star's last hurrah? O'Ward's year?
Kyle Larson will try 'the double' again this year doing the 500 and Charlotte NASCAR race on the same day.
Amazingly he was fifth in Indy qualifying last year, but his race was less productive.
Add to that the fact he crashed his test car at the open test last month and that there's been a significant amount of personnel shuffling at the McLaren team, and it makes you wonder what to expect from the crossover king. And this is likely his last 500 for a while.
There's also the intriguing subplot that if for instance a rain delay holds up the start of the 500 and Larson has to bolt for Charlotte, it'll be McLaren's Indy-winning team boss Tony Kanaan at the wheel of his car.
The storyline of Christian Lundgaard coming into Arrow McLaren and matching and beating Pato O'Ward on occasion can't have been easy for the Mexican. This is his chance to shine again.
Every year it feels like O'Ward comes close to winning the 500, including last season when he was passed on the last lap in one of the great Indy 500 finishes by Josef Newgarden.
The only way to silence those annoying questions will be to win the race, and honestly it would be hard to find someone in the paddock as desperate as Pato to get that win.
Can Fox step up?
It's been an up-and-down start for Fox's new role as IndyCar's broadcaster.
In one sense it's brought unrivalled publicity, but on the other, and in conjunction with IndyCar, there have been plenty of issues including graphics failing, timing and scoring malfunctioning and even the broadcast going off air for a short time in the second round at Thermal.
NBC's award-winning past coverage will be a tough benchmark for Fox this month as it faces broadcasting for six or seven hours per day during practice, and with the increased viewership this race brings there will be nowhere to hide.
This isn't us saying it will go wrong, but we can only go off what we've seen so far. There are plenty of positives, but worries, too.
How will the hybrid work?
We asked Palou to explain how he thinks the new hybrid unit will work in practice.
"I think the hybrid makes it a lot more challenging for the driver, you're going to be seeing a lot more mistakes," he says.
"Small mistakes. I'm not talking like sudden crashes. I'm talking about missing a little bit the apex or going too deep or just not getting a good exit and then suddenly giving somebody else a chance to overtake you - or you getting a chance to overtake the car in front because of that small mistake.
"And then on top of that, when you think about when we're in the draft and we cannot overtake, we lift the throttle and at that moment you recharge the battery. If you can suddenly do the opposite of the car in front and still be close, you're going to have a little bit more power, which in my opinion will be sufficient enough to overtake the car in front.
"So I think it's going to create more opportunities. Hopefully I'm right. And I think we're going to be seeing a lot more overtakes when you're like fourth-fifth-sixth in the pack.
"In the past couple of three years we've never seen passes there and hopefully now we're going to see a lot more opportunities happen."
Records that could be broken
Newgarden is trying to become the first three-in-a-row winner of the Indy 500. Castroneves is trying to become the first driver to win five races, and would become the oldest, having just turned 50 last week.
With a pole, Scott Dixon could tie the great Rick Mears' record of six. The 2024 race broke the record for most number of leaders at 16.
Full schedule - local (ET) and UK time
Tuesday May 13
Practice - 1200-1400 (1700-1900 UK)
Rookie orientation and refreshers - 1400-1600 (1900-2100 UK)
Practice - 1600-1800 (2100-2300 UK)
Wednesday May 14
Practice - 1200-1800 (1700-2300 UK)
Thursday May 15
Practice - 1200-1800 (1700-2300 UK)
Friday May 16
Practice - 1200-1800 (1700-2300 UK)
Saturday May 17
Practice - 0830-0930 (1330-1430 UK)
Qualifying - 1100-1750 (1600-2250 UK)
Sunday May 18
Practice - 1300-1500 (1800-2000 UK)
Top 12 qualifying - 1605-1705 (2105-2205 UK)
Last Chance qualifying - 1715-1815 (2215-2315 UK)
Fast Six qualifying - 1825-1855 (2325-2355 UK)
Monday May 19
Practice - 1300-1500 (1800-2000 UK)
Friday May 23
Practice - 1100-1300 (1600-1800 UK)
Sunday May 25
Race start - 1245 (1745 UK)
What to look out for in practice
From Tuesday to Thursday, teams are basically free to test as they wish for the Indy 500 - but it's nuanced.
The first thing to remember is that the open test last month is not representative, so laptimes from that should be taken with a whole container of salt. You don't know what programmes and fuel loads each car was running.
The rookie orientations (rookies have to drive at a set speed for a number of laps to pass before being able to practice) and refreshers (a similar programme to the rookies for drivers who haven't done an oval race since the previous Indy 500) take place on Tuesday.
But once those are complete, general practice can start and you'll see most teams focus heavily on perfecting their race cars in traffic - remember, the new hybrid unit has added weight and will make the car a handful, especially at the end of stints.
Watch for cars that are fast into long runs, that are able to draft up to and past cars ahead, look settled when running in long trains of cars. And, if a team is doing qualifying running, it will look for clean air and do a four-lap simulation reflecting qualifying.
Teams will do a smattering of qualifying preparation through Tuesday-Thursday, but most of it will be saved for 'Fast Friday' when the turbo boost is turned up as it will be for qualifying that weekend. That's when the car is most representative of what to expect for qualifying.
We'll do a full run-through of how qualifying works in the Indy 500 in a piece coming later this week.
