Here’s what’s happening this week Inside The Garage:
- Mick Schumacher’s INDYCAR preparations
- Tony Stewart back racing at Daytona
- Corey LaJoie’s big opportunity
Mick Schumacher will get his first taste of only turning left — and not right — when he takes some laps this week at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
The private test on the 1.5-mile track will be the first for the former Formula 1 driver to experience on an oval. Schumacher will get another shot at the full-field test Feb. 17-18 at the 1-mile Phoenix Raceway, where he will compete in his first oval event on March 7.
“I’m just looking forward to getting a first taste of what an oval feels like,” Schumacher told me Wednesday during the INDYCAR production days. “Phoenix is going to be great because it’s going to be with everybody else.
“So I’ll get a taste of also how it feels to drive in traffic. It will be a good two-step approach to ovals.”
Will Mick Schumacher find success in Year 1 in INDYCAR?
So far, Schumacher has spent about a day in a simulator working on Homestead.
“Obviously, there’s only so much you can do on a simulator,” Schumacher said during his general media session. “It just keeps going left. There’s not much you can really learn from it, bumps and all that and the way the car behaves is quite difficult to replicate.
“But I’ll have time to get through it and understand how it feels to drive an oval. I think that, in terms of preparation and also the way we approach the test, is going to be quite good and specific to how we want to run and how the car should behave throughout Homestead so that we’re best prepared for Phoenix.”
The son of seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher, Mick Schumacher made the shift to INDYCAR this year after competing in F1 for Haas and then serving as a reserve driver for Mercedes for one year, while also competing two seasons in the World Endurance Championship for Alpine.
“[It’s] good racing, good people,” Schumacher said. “The competition is quite fierce and strong. So I’m looking forward to competing with them and excited to go racing.”
Schumacher also has something new to look forward to and that’s a new paint scheme for 2026. RLL has not unveiled his livery yet.
However, the 26-year-old driver has seen some proposed liveries.
“I’ve seen potentials of it,” he said. “I don’t really care about how the car looks as long as it’s fast.”
Schumacher obviously isn’t one of those drivers who believes that a cool-looking paint scheme will help him go faster. For context, Dale Earnhardt Jr. has often said he felt he ran better if he liked what his car looked like.
“If, you know, the car is quick,” Schumacher said, “you’ll look cool.”
While NASCAR kicks off this season on Wednesday with the rescheduled exhibition Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium, INDYCAR teams have another nearly four weeks until they are on track at St. Petersburg for their first event of the season.
Some drivers will test Sebring in a week (Feb. 9-10) before going to Phoenix.
Corey LaJoie’s Two Big Weeks
Corey LaJoie is getting to race for two consecutive weeks in a ride he couldn’t predict he would have when the 2025 season ended.
The former full-time Cup driver was the designated backup driver for Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing last year and was on standby in case Brad Keselowski had to leave for the birth of his child.
LaJoie never got into an RFK car. But he’ll get to drive RFK cars for the first two events this year.
Corey LaJoie will be behind the wheel for RFK to kick off the 2026 NASCAR season.
He’ll compete in the Clash as the substitute for Keselowski, who broke his leg in December.
He will then drive a fourth RFK car, the No. 99, in the Daytona 500, as long as he qualifies. RFK had explored fielding a fourth car for select races, especially at the superspeedways, where it helps to have teammates because of the need to work together in the draft.
“It might be the last one [for me in the 500] and I’ve raced every one like it’s my last one for a couple years now.,” LaJoie said. “This came out of nowhere. [RFK President] Chip [Bowers] and Brad and their entire team called me up and offered me this opportunity, which I never saw coming.
“So in my opinion, it’s house money. I’m going to have some fun with it.”
But first is the Clash. LaJoie won an ARCA East race at Bowman Gray in 2012.
“Just to get into the system and see those guys operate in the sim and in pre-race meetings and during the course of a race weekend is a credible experience for me to learn how champions operate,” LaJoie said.
“I’ve won there in the past, beat some really good guys. So I think that we can go have a legitimately good run.”
Heim Time?
Corey Heim, the 2025 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series champion, still does not have a 2026 schedule announced. But 23XI Racing did finally confirm that he will compete in the Daytona 500.
Heim is expected to do a dozen or so Cup races this year and select events in trucks. Whether he gets any starts in what is now the O’Reilly Series (formerly Xfinity) is still to be determined.
Heim is also the reserve and simulator driver for 23XI Racing, so that will keep him busy, even though he won’t be racing for a title in any series this season.
Corey Heim will begin the 2026 season with a start at Daytona.
“It’s more just the way it is,” Heim said. “I’ve always been a person that takes each opportunity as how it’s presented, if you will. And I feel like I’ve got a good opportunity to go out and compete and run up front and run well and build on my career, whatever it may be.
“And this year is no different than that. So at the end of the day, I feel like I’m pretty privileged to have these opportunities in my career, and I feel pretty blessed to be in the position I’m at. So I don’t feel like there’s any lack of opportunity on my end.”
In The News
— LaJoie and Heim are expected to be among eight open drivers vying for four spots in the Daytona 500. LaJoie, Heim and Front Row Motorsports driver Chandler Smith were recent adds to the list of those who have announced an attempt to make the race. They join Anthony Alfredo (Beard Motorsports), Justin Allgaier (JR Motorsports), B.J. McLeod (Live Fast Motorsports), Casey Mears (Garage 66) and JJ Yeley (NY Racing). Jimmie Johnson is also entered as an open car, but he will get the open exemption provisional, so he is guaranteed a spot in the field, which will be expanded to 41 cars.
— Tony Stewart is competing in the truck race at Daytona as part of the Kaulig Racing free-agent truck that Ram has designated to have multiple drivers throughout the year. Stewart said since there is a prize for the driver with the most points scored in the truck, he wouldn’t rule out doing another truck race in the season.
“I would love to sit here and go, ‘Man, this is just one and done,’” Stewart said in a teleconference with reporters. “I would say my answer is I don’t have an answer. … Let’s just say I’ll leave it open-ended at this point.
“Thank God my wife’s not here. I’d have a book or shoe or something flying at me right now. But we’ll just leave it open-ended at this point for a while.”
Social Spotlight
Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!
They Said It
“What are you going to do? We all just have to ride it out and see. That’s obviously the approach.”
— Reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Larson on the Clash being postponed because of snow.
Did You Know?
No NASCAR national series race was postponed because of weather in 2025. So maybe the Clash being postponed three days because of snow is just making up for that.
In Inside The Garage, Bob Pockrass takes us behind the scenes of the motorsports world the way only he can.
