Hailie Deegan ends Indy NXT rookie season with best qualifying and strong run at Nashville finale
- RACERS
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Hailie Deegan completed her Indy NXT rookie season with her best qualifying performance and a strong run to P13 at the Nashville finale, highlighting the progress made throughout her debut year in single-seaters.
The Indy NXT season concluded after 14 rounds at Nashville Superspeedway, where Hailie Deegan wrapped up her rookie campaign in single-seater racing.
It was clear from the beginning that her debut year would not be a walk in the park. Coming from a vastly different background — with most of her career spent in NASCAR-sanctioned series and only a handful of starts in sportscars before her formula debut — the step up to Indy NXT, one of the toughest open-wheel championships and the top feeder series to IndyCar, was a leap into the deep end.
Yet Deegan showed encouraging signs throughout the year. She approached the challenge as she was supposed to: learning the platform, discovering the car lap by lap, and making gradual improvements at every event.
The second half of the season, in particular, revealed glimpses of her potential. Driving for HMD Motorsports, Deegan consistently closed the gap to the more experienced drivers and came close to breaking into the top ten at Laguna Seca; in her home state, she delivered her strongest weekend in terms of results, with P12 and P11 in the double-header. The WeatherTech Raceway was also a track where she had prior experience from IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, which showed in her performance.
Her biggest strides, however, came in the final two oval rounds. At the Milwaukee Mile, she took P14 before heading to Nashville Superspeedway for the season finale. There, she produced arguably her most convincing performance of the year: qualifying inside the top ten, running competitive lap times, staying on the lead lap, and finishing P13 while remaining within striking distance of the cars ahead for most of the race.
The combination of improved speed and her natural oval racecraft carried over from her NASCAR background highlighted her progression at the end of what was naturally a learning-oriented season. With only one start in a formula car prior to the Indy NXT campaign, Deegan can be satisfied with her development across the year.
Her Nashville weekend started promisingly in the sole practice session, where she clocked a 26.2881 lap to go 16th fastest in a tightly packed field. Qualifying followed with the two-lap average format, and Deegan impressed with a 26.308-second lap at an average speed of 181.994 mph. Remarkably, she held second place early in the session and eventually qualified tenth, just two tenths off the top five, in what was by far her best qualifying result of the season.
From tenth on the grid, Deegan took the green flag in the season finale behind leaders Salvador de Alba and Caio Collet. She slotted into P15 on the opening lap but ran competitive times in the 26.3s, quicker than the cars directly ahead. Shadowing Sebastian Murray while keeping Nolan Allaer behind, Deegan steadily improved her pace, running just a couple of tenths off the leaders.
On lap 11 she set a 26.299 — matching the pace of the top four. When Tommy Smith was forced to pit, she moved up to P14, holding position comfortably.
The race was briefly neutralized on lap 31 when Callum Hedge and Michael d’Orlando collided while battling for seventh, bringing out a caution. Hedge’s heavy impact with the wall caused significant damage to his Abel Motorsports car, but he emerged unhurt. Deegan gained another position under yellow, moving up to P13. At the restart on lap 45, d’Orlando served a penalty for causing the contact, elevating Deegan to P12.
She stayed close to Roe at the restart and soon delivered her personal best lap: a 26.140 on lap 52, which was the fastest time on track on that lap. Although Allaer eventually found a way past, Deegan remained close, running consistently strong laps in the closing stages. Despite not quite managing to retake the position, she crossed the line in P13, ending her rookie year with one of her most competitive drives.
While she didn’t quite match her personal best race finish of P11 at Laguna Seca, the Nashville run was a significant step forward, particularly in terms of pace and race execution. The result also secured her 14th place in the championship standings out of 27 drivers to have started at least one race, moving her ahead of Tommy Smith.
Coming from an entirely different discipline of motorsport, Deegan’s first single-seater campaign can be considered a success. She gained valuable experience at circuits she had never driven on before, learned to handle a powerful formula car, and went wheel-to-wheel against rivals with years of open-wheel background. She proved reliable, avoided major mistakes, and maximized the learning opportunities across the year. With this foundation, Hailie Deegan can now aim for further progress in 2026.