Is Kakunoshin Ohta a Future IndyCar Champion?
Images credit: Super Formula
Amidst an enthralling 2026 Season Championship battle that sees a number of drivers attempting to knock Álex Palou from his throne, an intriguing and downright surprising silly season has also been underway in IndyCar’s driver market.
Rumours and hearsay have swirled about for weeks and months, almost as soon as the 2026 NTT IndyCar season got underway at St. Petersburg back in March. But it wasn’t until the shock announcement that Scott Dixon would be parting ways with Chip Ganassi after twenty four years with the team that events really took a turn.
Image credit: Penske Entertainment
Following news of this shattering departure came the revelation that Arrow McLaren would be shedding two thirds of their current driver line-up in Championship contender Christian Lundgaard and pupil of Tony Kanaan, Nolan Siegel to make way for both Scott Dixon and this year’s Indianapolis 500 winner Felix Rosenqvist - who would return to the team that he left in 2023. Andretti Global too confirmed their 2027 line-up with the final piece of their particular puzzle being the re-signing of Marcus Ericsson alongside Kyle Kirkwood and Will Power.
However, Chip Ganassi still has a seat on the table and moreover, teams like Dayle Coyne Racing, Junos Hollinger Racing and even Team Penske are all assessing their current roster of drivers and contemplating if any of them should be altered ahead of next season.
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Meyer Shank Racing too has a seat to fill thanks to Rosenqvist’s exit. Marcus Armstrong has already been confirmed to continue racing for the team in 2027 and after his steady progression with the team over the past two seasons, it’s not a mystery as to why they decided to keep him on the books.
The team is at an inflexion point too, having been a dark horse in the 2026 IndyCar season all year long. Nowhere was that more evident that at the 110th running of the Indianapolis 500 where Rosenqvist took victory for the team, snatching it away by the narrowest of margins from the Team Penske driver of David Malukas.
Long Beach, Road America and Nashville were also venues where victory was on the cards for the outfit with Rosenqvist for the first and the third of those and Marcus Armstrong in position for the win at Road America until a mechanical DNF in the closing stages of the race robbed him of that opportunity.
As a team in the ascension that is capable of winning multiple Indianapolis 500s and edging nearer to race wins on other circuits, it’s an attractive prospect for any driver currently looking to move elsewhere in IndyCar - look at the likes of Mick Schumacher, Rinus Veekay and Dennis Hauger as examples of this.
It’s what makes the driver market for this team rather intriguing because there is another driver arguably in the running for that seat with the team next season.
Enter Kakunoshin Ohta.
Image credit: Super Formula
The Japanese driver is currently competing in the Super Formula Championship in his home country, leading the Championship with 105 points to his name. He sits 45.5 points clear of his nearest rival and defending Champion Ayumu Iwasa with four rounds of the season remaining.
He has finished every race so far in the points with victories in Motegi and Fuji, as well as having two fastest laps and a Pole Position to his name, the latter of which he clinched in Motegi.
One of the reasons that makes Ohta a contender for one of the seats at Meyer Shank is the fact that he completed his first official IndyCar test with Meyer Shank Racing in October of last year at Mid-Ohio. What’s more the team is powered by Honda and one of Ohta’s principle sponsors in Super Formula is NTT - the title sponsor of IndyCar. All of those things together are too convenient to just be a coincidence. While there will be many drivers hungry to take that second seat at Meyer Shank, the team wouldn’t be blamed for opting for a driver with which they have recent history, especially if a deal can be struck with Honda too to help make it worth their while.
But aside from confidently leading the Super Formula Championship, what else makes Ohta a possibility for a switch to IndyCar in 2027?
Images credit: Super Formula
At twenty-seven years of age, he’s already amassed three Championships to his name across three different series and a further four runner up spots since 2021.
Ohta has competed in Japanese Formula 4, Super Formula Lights and Super Formula but single seaters isn’t where all of his racing history lies. Ohta has also raced in Super GT and IMSA, where he competed in the same team as Álex Palou in 2024. With multiple years in both Endurance Racing and single-seater racing under his belt and at a time where he appears to be on the rise, Ohta may want to avoid following in the footsteps of some of his fellow countrymen.
Iwasa raced in Formula 3 and Formula 2 before winning the Super Formula Championship in 2025 but was never able to get into Formula 1 - his ultimate ambition. Another former Champion in both Super GT and Super Formula, Ritomo Miyata, also made the jump to Formula 2 but in his three seasons there has struggled to turn heads with only a single podium finish to his name from that time. Maybe it’s time for Ohta to break the trend and cross over into IndyCar instead. If he were to race in the series next year, he would be the first full time Japanese driver in the Championship since Takuma Sato in 2022.
The arrival of a brand new car in IndyCar in 2028 too means that it’s the perfect time to bed yourself in with a team, learn the ropes and get to grips with all you need to know ahead of the big change and take advantage of it as best you can to hopefully jump ahead of your rivals. If Meyer Shank are looking at the best way to make that step up to be consistently fighting with the titans of the sport, they’ll need two hungry and capable drivers. They already have one of those in Marcus Armstrong but Kakunoshin Ohta is surely a very tempting prospect that offers the team something fresh that none of the other drivers available in either IndyCar or Indy NXT do.
But it’s not just Meyer Shank Racing where Ohta could find a home in 2027.
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Another of the teams with an unconfirmed line-up for next season is A.J Foyt Enterprises. This year, Santino Ferrucci and Caio Collet are driving for the legendary outfit but neither driver has yet been confirmed for a return to the team in 2027.
Ferrucci currently sits down in seventeenth position overall in the points standings, with his rookie teammate Collet forty-nine points adrift of him. In his sixth full season in the series, Ferrucci is a driver that both excites and underwhelms. His on track ability consistently makes fans and commentators alike sit on the edge of their seats as you never truly know what he’s about to do. The same goes for his fellow drivers on track which can, and has, lead to fiery confrontations. The American driver came to IndyCar after a turbulent time racing in Europe where making friends either on track or off wasn’t a particular specialty of his. Since his move to IndyCar, Ferrucci has shown flashes of promise, such as his two podium appearances last season in Detroit and Road America. But even then, he still only finished in sixteenth place overall and a year later, is just under a hundred points away from his total haul last season with just six races to go.
With a best finish of ninth place overall back in 2024, Ferrucci may find himself back in IndyCar next season - just not with A.J Foyt Enterprises. He needs to make this last stint of races in 2026 count if he wants to secure his future with the team.
On the other side of the garage is Brazilian driver Caio Collet. Coming into IndyCar after a third place finish in the Indy NXT Championship last season, many were unsure of what the rookie would be capable of in his debut season. While he is yet to break into the top ten in terms of results, (Ferrucci himself only has three of those this season), it’s his raw pace, particularly on ovals, that is impressing both his peers in the team and others up and down the IndyCar paddock.
A string of bad luck has followed him on ovals, such as his fiery exit from the Indianapolis 500, but for those who look past the results on the page, they can see there’s untapped potential here that’s worth keeping. Confirmation on if A.J Foyt will be the team to sign him next season is not yet public knowledge but Collet has the benefits of youth and unknown potential on his side - both things that Ferrucci lacks.
If they were to retain Collet, Ohta would also fit snugly in here too. He’s a driver with raw speed and power when he gets into a car, as displayed not just this season in Super Formula but in his past Championship victories and contentions. His most recent wins at Fuji in a range of changing on track conditions showed the world the kind of monster that he is in a single-seater and for a team like A.J Foyt, that’s the type of driver they’d love to sign. Arguably he’s a heightened version of what Ferrucci is in a driver but with more results to back up his potential as well as more control in the car and of his temperament than the American has.
Image credit: Super Formula
Both Meyer Shank Racing and A.J Foyt are looking at ways to get to the top of IndyCar and by signing Kakunoshin Ohta, neither team could be criticized for making a false move. It would be a risk certainly, but that’s almost every decision that you make in motorsport. Having raced alongside Palou in the recent past too, there’s always an outside chance that the Spaniard points his team in Ohta’s direction as they’ve got a seat on the grid to fill too. They’re also a team that is powered by Honda.
Regardless of where he may end up on the IndyCar grid in 2027, the only real shock would be if somehow Kakunoshin Ohta doesn’t end up there at all.