Free Member Preview: IndyCar Ratings Index

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This offseason, the site is adding some exciting elements while reporting the most important motorsports news through the cold winter months. As a free subscriber, you'll continue to receive all the same great news and information you already do.

The largest addition to Twin Checkers this offseason will be the IndyCar Ratings Index. An improved metric for the site (R.I.P. TCM), its formula can be applied to rate every individual season in IndyCar history.

It's a motorsports-oriented version of the Rating Percentage Index (RPI) used to rate things like college basketball teams. Instead of taking percentages of raw wins and losses, the IRI uses top five, top ten, top 20 and finishing percentage to create a motorsports equivalent — one that can work perfectly with any major motorsports series.

For now, it will focus specifically on IndyCar. Every week during the 2023 season, premium subscribers will get an updated every week following a race on driver ratings. In addition, premium subscribers will have access to an IRI historic database for every IndyCar season recorded.

The IRI will be great at finding out which drivers in a given week can be expected to show up and show out, and which victories are true upsets when they happen.

Another aspect of the IRI is estimating how part-time drivers would fair in the series if they competed in every race.

In conjunction with the IRI, a calculated curve can predict a driver's expected points per race throughout the season. This will adjust as the historical database changes and plots more drivers to find a more accurate curve, but expect a finalized one by the end of the offseason. By race 3, we should have a fairly clear picture of who our championship favorites are in the IndyCar series.

I've included a snapshot of what the 2022 season looked like in retrospect with the formulas applied below.

A few interesting insights:

• Josef Newgarden's boom or bust season hurt his overall IRI, and he overperformed weekly projections by almost three points.
• Scott Dixon effectively ended his championship with a pit road penalty at the Indianapolis 500 despite a very good and consistent season, but Will Power's 70.6% top five rate was too good to beat.
• Santino Ferrucci was a top 15 driver on a very limited part-time schedule. If A.J. Foyt Racing can make technical gains over the offseason, Ferrucci could end up challenging for the top 22 positions and Leader's Circle money.

Ready to reserve your spot when IRI officially launches and unlock commenting on the website right away? Subscribe as a premium member today.

Use the code OFFSEASON22 to take 40% off your first 6 months, then pay the low price of $5 a month to receive IndyCar analysis you won't get anywhere else.