Nashville, TN. (Monday, August 7, 2023)- Irish driver James Roe and the Music City harmonized well as Roe and his No. 29 Topcon Andretti Autosport machine finished fourth in the Firestone Music City Grand Prix – his best finish in the INDY NXT™ by Firestone series and his third top-five finish of the season.

After a strong Practice 1 and a limited Practice 2, a qualifying rain out left the No. 29 coming off the grid eighth based on championship points. The 24-year-old leveraged experience and race craft to navigate  multiple incidents on the challenging street course. Having executed a number of strategic overtakes throughout the race, Roe added a final one on the last corner of the last lap to secure fourth position.

“It was a good race,” Roe said. “Obviously, qualifying was on championship points which we weren’t super pleased of as a team because we had mega pace. We were P2 in Practice 1 and had a mechanical in Practice 2 so we didn’t get to show anything there, but we knew we had very quick cars. We started 8th and stayed out of trouble, made some moves and finished fourth.”

Roe’s performance launched him from eighth to seventh in the championship standings  for his partners Topcon, CES Power, Strong Roots, Ring Power Corporation, The Ireland Funds, and GAAPP. With 219 points, he now sits just six points out of sixth place.

“It was a massive points day for the team with moving to seventh in the championship points and we have five more rounds to go,” Roe said.

Roe and the INDY NXT series will be back in action Friday, August 11 at the world-famous Indianapolis Motor Speedway to take on the 2.4-mile road course.

ABOUT JAMES ROE

Hometown: Naas, Co. Kildare, Ireland

Residence: Indianapolis

Age: 24

2023 Car: No. 29 Topcon Andretti Autosport Dallara

Points Position: 7

Social: @jamesroe_ie (Instagram), @jamesroe_IE (Twitter), @JamesRoeJr (Facebook)