Takuma Sato, driver of the No. 14 Honda of A.J. Foyt Enterprises, was not in the running for the championship in 2015, but he was able to close out his third year with the team finishing in the top-10 in the final two races at Pocono and Sonoma.
Finishing 2015 strong
Crossing the line sixth in the ABC Supply 500 at Pocono Raceway that saw an unusual number of crashes, then finishing eighth at the finale at Sonoma Raceway, the Japanese driver put the No. 14 car in the top-10 for the final two races of the 2015 Verizon IndyCar Series season.
Considering the difficulty Sato faced at the oval rounds this year, the result at Pocono is impressive. After being involved in a three-car crash in the opening turn of the Indianapolis 500, the first oval of the year, Sato's bad luck at the ovals seemed to follow him through the remainder of the season, finishing five laps down at the Firestone 600 at Texas Motor Speedway and crashing out with Will Power at the exciting MAVTV 500, for a start.
With a best finish of second at Race 2 in Detroit and the five top-10 finishes at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course (9th), Detroit (Race 2; 2nd), Toronto (10th), Pocono (6th) and Sonoma (8th), the Japanese driver’s average finish through the 16 rounds of 2015 was 13.75.
The sixth and eighth-place finishes at the last two races of what was a remarkable 2015 season were his second and third best finishes of the year, behind only the aforementioned second-place in Detroit.
Fifth top-10 of 2015 at Sonoma
Finishing eighth in the 85-lap, double-points-paying GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma finale round, Sato earned his fifth top-10 result of the 2015 season.
“It was a tough start for us from 18th so we had to try a different strategy from the leaders – different pit stop sequence – in order to move forward," said Sato after the race. "Indeed we did."
Sato credited the No. 14 A.J. Foyt Enterprises crew for a “fantastic” job executing the pit stops during the race, which allowed him “to be able to fight on the track.”
Finishing the race between Will Power in seventh and Rodolfo Gonzalez in ninth, Sato said he “had a couple overtakings which [he] really enjoyed.”
“A top-10 is a good way to finish off the season and we learned so much because we had a two-car team this year which helped this team to move forward.”
Finishing 14th overall in the driver championship points standings for 2015, Sato improved by four spots after he finished 18th in the 2014 standings.
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Aaron Durant is the editor of the VAVEL USA Racing section. Follow him on Twitter at @DoubleA291.