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The Andretti / Steinbrenner livery will be back next year in the NTT IndyCar series.
As reported for the first time by RACER.com last month, Colton Herta will join Alexander Rossi, Marco Andretti, Ryan Hunter-Reay and Zach Veach in the fifth car of Andretti Autosport with the support of the Steinbrenner family. Official confirmation is expected Saturday in Laguna Seca.
George Michael Steinbrenner and his father Hank, co-owner and co-chair of the New York Yankees, began sponsoring Herta at Indy Lights for Andretti in 2017 and continued their association with the 19-year-old phenomenon at IndyCar this year with Mike Harding.
Herta was essentially an unofficial Andretti rider in his impressive rookie season thanks to Harding Steinbrenner's technical partnership with the team, which included Nathan O'Rourke's engineering know-how, which had been loaned to Harding by Andretti.
The last few months have been hectic for Herta, who became the youngest IndyCar winner ever (18) earlier this season at COTA. He had a multi-year contract with Harding, but the team has been financially threatened for a few months and his future is very uncertain.
But Andretti also signed a three-year contract with Herta that replaced Harding and gave him the opportunity to lead the second-generation pilot or find him a means of transport before pursuing other opportunities.
Herta was also on the verge of becoming the lead actor in a McLaren / Andretti alliance in 2020. McLaren President and CEO Zak Brown made Andretti a very generous offer to resume the partnership begun in 2017 with Fernando Alonso in Indianapolis. Due to the negative feelings between McLaren and Honda, Andretti should have gone to Chevrolet.
While Honda was in danger of losing Herta, Rossi and Hunter-Reay, he decided to keep a game save package, with the help of DHL and AutoNation, to keep Andretti on board.
Immediately after it was confirmed that Rossi would remain with Andretti and the team remained with Honda, the agreement between McLaren and Arrow SPM had been announced, allowing SPM to withdraw from its contract with Honda and join Chevy. James Hinchcliffe has a contract with Arrow SPM and Brown is currently discussing with Conor Daly, among others, about the second seat.
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