Photo: Gavin Baker Photography
Yuven Sundaramoorthy has been forced to withdraw from his 2025 Indy Nxt seat with Abel Motorsports due to a change in his budgetary position.
The 21-year-old has been with the team since the 2023, when he contested four races and had a best finish of ninth.
He then drove for the team full-time in the championship this year, coming eighth in the standings with highlights including two fourth places at Laguna Seca (where he had claimed his best result as a rookie), third place at the Gateway oval and then second in the finale on the streets of Nashville in September.
That put him eighth in the standings, and two months later he was announced as remaining at Abel for 2025. At the time, he was setting raised expectations for his second full season after feeling he had made a breakthrough with Indy Nxt’s car.
“I definitely do [feel like I could be a team leader],” he said. “[For 2025] I am trying to go in as the number one driver. That’s the goal. Now, I’m the set-up guy for tests. Jacob [Abel] used to do the dirty work there, but now it’s me. So just kind of figuring everything out I can for the team.”
He added: “I think ovals are my big strong suit. I honestly think we can sweep all the ovals next year. My focus is getting a head start early in the season because I think if we’ve got a good lead after most of the road course races earlier in the year, we have no problem winning all the ovals.”
However he now has to postpone those personal expectations to 2026, when he plans to make a return to the grid.
“After much consideration, I want to announce that I won’t be competing with Abel Motorsports,” he said on December 11, just 20 days after announcing his 2025 drive. Sundaramoorthy credited “unforeseen budget challenges” for changing plans.
“This isn’t the end – just the beginning of new possibilities. Stay tuned, and I look forward to what’s next,” he added. “We are already hard at work to be back for 2026 with Abel in Indy Nxt.”
The team is believed to already have a replacement driver lined up for next season, when the championship will be directed by Richard Buck. Formerly a team manager, race strategist and crew chief at multiple teams in Indy car racing through the 1980s and ’90s, as he also had a junior single-seater involvement in the formerly Indy Nxt-rivaling Atlantics series.
Buck takes over his new position from Levi Jones, after a three-month search by the Indy Nxt-owning Penske Entertainment organisation.