Graham Rahal lashes out at FOX for promoting only 3 drivers and ignoring IndyCar's 'GOAT'

Graham Rahal has called out FOX for being imperfect in its IndyCar promotions. The media giant, which became IndyCar's exclusive broadcasting partner in 2025, went heavy on the preseason promotions, including buying four ad spots during Super Bowl 59, which became the most-watched game in NFL history.

However, FOX chose only three drivers' journeys to document in its ingenious promos - defending Indy 500 winner Josef Newgarden, defending champ Alex Palou, and the series' most popular driver, Pato O'Ward. In a recent appearance on the SpeedFreaks podcast, Rahal highlighted how such concentrated focus will cost IndyCar.

"Let's be honest here. When you look at marketing, they're only marketing three drivers. That's factual. The only things you have seen to date is Pato, Josef, and Palou. There's a lot of other great people; forget about me because as we talked about off-air, I could care less about attention. I've got way better things and more important things to do in my life than worry about if somebody on Twitter likes me or not," Graham Rahal said. [5:08 onwards]

The 37-year-old driver couldn't understand why FOX didn't also make promos on IndyCar veterans like two-time champ Will Power or the 'GOAT' Scott Dixon, a six-time champion.

"You've got guys like Will Power who have stood the test of time that continue to have exceptional races. You've got Scott Dixon. How do you ignore Scott Dixon? (He's the) Greatest of all time. I understand that Alex Palou is beating Scott Dixon week in and week out nowadays, but that doesn't take away from who he is or what he has done or what he continues to do," Rahal added.

Graham Rahal is in his 19th year in the premier American open-wheel racing series. He has shown great race pace in the first two races of 2025 to overcome qualifying failures and get P12 and P11 results at St. Petersburg and the Thermal Club.

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Graham Rahal says it's "not fair" for IndyCar to rely solely on FOX for viewership boom

Graham Rahal's No. 15 RLL Honda at the 108th running of the Indianapolis 500 - Source: Getty

FOX has experienced the bittersweet fruition of its promotional efforts for IndyCar. The season-opening Grand Prix of St. Petersburg witnessed record viewership, with 1.417 million viewers watching on average. However, the TV viewership tanked over 50% for the second race, the inaugural Thermal Club Grand Prix.

Suddenly, doomsday predictions popped up on social media that Graham Rahal vehemently fought against. The 37-year-old recently acknowledged on the aforementioned podcast that the picture isn't "rosy", but FOX needs to be given time to live up to its promises.

"I don't think it's fair to solely rely on FOX. I think FOX is going to do tremendous things for our sport. As I said a minute ago, we are in the early days of FOX. I think the future is great for what FOX brings to us," Rahal said.

However, the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing driver did agree that the 2025 IndyCar schedule "is a bit of a head-scratcher." There is a three-week-long gap between the first and second races of the season, and the same for the second and third races. After that, the series has scheduled races for nearly all weekends until the season finale at Nashville on August 31.

The next race weekend is in California, where IndyCar will host its 50th Long Beach Grand Prix.