Romain Grosjean is set to run the short oval at World Wide Technology Raceway, better known as Gateway, when IndyCar visits in August.
Grosjean is only running the road courses with Dale Coyne Racing this year, his debut IndyCar season, in part due to safety concerns on the fast ovals.
While Texas Motor Speedway and Indianapolis produce very high speeds, Gateway is run with the high downforce package and has an average race speed around 175 mph.
The long-time F1 driver spoke to team owners Dale Coyne and Rick Ware about the possibility of running the upcoming race, and he now seems to have been given the green light.
Speaking with Motorsport.com, Coyne confirmed that the plan is to have Grosjean run the race at Gateway next month.
“We’re going to test with Romain at Gateway on July 27, because we have every intention of doing the race there next month,” said Coyne.
“It’s going to be a good test there, because there’ll be quite a few cars there, so we’ll have a chance for him to run alone and then as he gets more confident we can put him in traffic so he gets to learn what dirty air is really all about!
“It’s also a good test because it’s a day-and-night test – runs from mid-afternoon to 11 o’clock at night – so it will also give him a good experience of how a track evolves, the different downforce levels he’ll feel in hot conditions and night conditions.
“Yeah, it should be a really good experience for a rookie.”
Grosjean has proved himself quite adept at adjusting to IndyCar, having already taken his maiden pole position and frequently placing himself in the top third of the timesheets.
The 1.25-mile oval will be quite a different experience for the Frenchman, however, as he does not have a history of racing anything other than road courses in his career.
There could be plenty of opportunity to add races to his schedule if he decides to run more short ovals in the future, since Roger Penske recently revealed plans to add more ovals to the calendar in upcoming years.
The Bommarito Auto Group 500 will be run on the evening of August 21, following the upcoming races from the streets of Nashville and the Indianapolis road course.
