Hornish’s plans were the subject of much speculation after owner Roger Penske entered a No. 77 car in the Indy 500 – and didn’t say who would be driving it. Hornish, a former Indy 500 winner, is in his first NASCAR season after leaving the Indy Racing League.
He said, “it’s not feasible to drive in both the Indy 500 and NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600. Both races are May 25.”
Coupled with news that the NASCAR team had also hired David Stremme as its test driver, many put one-and-one together and speculated that Hornish Jr. would compete at Indianapolis while turning over the NASCAR driving duties to Stremme.
“It threw a lot of people off because they entered the car as the No. 77,” Hornish said
“It was just something that people got all excited about or flustered about right off the bat. With the way that the schedule is, I’m not going to skip the 600 to go run at Indy.”
“I’d love to do both of them in one day, but if it has to be one or the other, I’m a stock car driver,” Hornish said.
Hornish was part of the mass exodus of open-wheel stars fleeing to NASCAR. He’s currently 33rd in the Sprint Cup point standings.
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