Christian Lundgaard finished a career-best fifth in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship standings despite a 25th-place result in the season-ending Borchetta Bourbon Music City Grand Prix presented by WillScot.
That Lundgaard even entered the season finale at Nashville Superspeedway with a chance to finish third overall when his previous career high was eighth in 2023 speaks volumes about his performance in 2025.
Driving the No. 7 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet in his first season with the team, Lundgaard enjoyed a breakout year. Although winless in 17 starts, he recorded six podium finishes — more than he had in 52 previous starts (three podiums) with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing from 2021-24. He also came close to matching his total number of top-five finishes with RLL (seven), collecting six this season.
“There were definitely races where I feel like I, or we as a team, lost points,” Lundgaard said. “But overall, we absolutely had the capability to be up there with Pato (O’Ward) and (Scott) Dixon, regardless of the final order.”
O’Ward, his Arrow McLaren teammate, also finished a career-best second in points. Dixon, a six-time series champion for Chip Ganassi Racing, was third, Kyle Kirkwood of Andretti Global fourth and Lundgaard fifth.
This was the first season Arrow McLaren has featured two legitimate championship contenders.
“The positive I take from 2025 is that I didn’t come here to take Pato’s (O’Ward) place,” Lundgaard said. “They asked if I could come in and help push the team forward, and I feel like we’ve done that. Pato achieved his best championship result and I think I’ve contributed to that. It’s been a success.
“Zak (Brown, McLaren CEO) is happy with my performance, the team is happy, and now it’s all about continuing to build.”
The No. 7 car Lundgaard inherited had just four podium finishes in its previous 81 starts, with points finishes of 21st, eighth, ninth and ninth in the standings – making Lundgaard’s turnaround all the more impressive.
Lundgaard’s progress has been steady since his rookie season in 2022, when he finished 14th in points. He followed that with eighth in 2023, dipped slightly to 11th in 2024 and climbed to fifth in 2025.
Taking the next step toward championship contention, oval performance remains the most obvious area for improvement.
Lundgaard scored the second-most road and street course points among 27 drivers, trailing only dominant champion Alex Palou of Chip Ganassi Racing.
But Lundgaard accumulated only the eighth-most points on ovals. That ranking, while lower, still represented a significant leap in performance.
Entering 2025, Lundgaard had made 17 oval starts with just two top-10 finishes – with ninth his best. This season, he collected three top-seven finishes in five oval starts, with an average oval finish improving each year.
That average was 18.4 as a rookie on circle tracks, 17.6 in 2023, 15.28 in 2024 and 13.16 last season.
On street circuits, he posted a career-best average finish of eighth, beating his previous best of 9.8 in 2023. His average on road courses was 7.42, slightly behind his 2023 average of sixth.
As he continues to climb the improvement ladder, who’s to stay Lundgaard won’t ascend to be a big threat to end Palou’s three-year championship streak?
“This season, I came into it with just wanting to be competitive, just wanting to get good results, walking on the door we had, so I think we’ve gotten some results we shouldn’t have, but we’ve lost some that I think we should have,” Lundgaard said. “So, ultimately, it’s been a very successful season, and if you told me that in January, I would have taken that without any thought.
“Obviously, I want to improve for next year.”