The 2026 Indianapolis 500 Open Test opened with a result almost no one in the paddock had on their card: Conor Daly, in the No. 23 Kingspan ARCO Chevrolet for Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, on top of the Day 1 sheet at the Brickyard.
Daly was one of only two drivers to crack the 225 mph barrier across the 2.5-mile oval on April 28, the opening day of a two-day shakedown that doubled as the first proper benchmark before the 110th running of the race. The result is the type of headline that the Open Test is built to produce — and the type of result that Dreyer & Reinbold, an Indy-only programme that has used Daly's services across multiple Indy 500 campaigns, badly needed.
For the smaller teams, the Open Test is the only neutral environment they get all month. Once the official month of May begins, every team is balancing tow effects, traffic, qualifying simulations and race trim work in compressed sessions. The Open Test gives an outfit like Dreyer & Reinbold a clean two days to look at base setup before the bigger operations roll out their full speedway programmes. Daly's pace at the front of the timing screen is the team's reward for arriving prepared.
It also reinforces how unpredictable the 110th edition could be. With FOX Sports stepping in as the new IndyCar broadcast partner — promising 60 hours of Indy 500 coverage in 2026 — and the Chevrolet Corvette ZR1X confirmed as pace car, the event is operating with new commercial energy. The grid, however, is more open than ever. Reigning series leaders are facing a rookie wave that includes confirmed entries from drivers who have not been in IndyCar machinery for years.
Conor Daly's own day produced a second piece of news for Dreyer & Reinbold. The team has now revealed his car liveries for the month — the Kingspan ARCO Chevrolet — and Daly's own social channels have moved into full Indy promotion mode, including a "Speed Street" recap of the Open Test from a driver's perspective. The signal is clear: a single-event entry that has been a heart-on-sleeve operation for years is genuinely positioned to make the show on speed alone.
The Day 1 group also offered familiar markers. Josef Newgarden, the two-time Indy 500 winner, arrived at the Speedway carrying what he has described as good vibes and ample speed, with Team Penske spending the test refining race-trim setup rather than chasing chasing one-lap pace. Pato O'Ward, Alex Palou, Marcus Ericsson and the broader top tier of full-time IndyCar runners spent Day 1 building data without showing their hands.
Day 2 saw the inevitable rebalancing. Once the engineering departments moved into qualifying-style trims, the speed sheets reorganised — but the Open Test is not, and was never intended to be, the qualifying simulator. It is the day where teams confirm aero baselines, engine maps and the point at which their drivers are comfortable at the limit. By that measure, Dreyer & Reinbold left the test with answers and direction.
The bigger story is that the 2026 Indy 500 grid is shaping up as one of the deepest in years. With Katherine Legge confirmed for an HMD/AJ Foyt entry, the Corvette ZR1X drawing its own crowd, and seasoned ovalists like Daly proving they still have the equipment to lead a session, the 110th Indy 500 is on track to deliver one of the more competitive 33-car fields the Speedway has hosted since the Penske acquisition.
Whether Daly can hold that pace once 32 other cars are on track is another question. But he has bought Dreyer & Reinbold a month of conversations starting from the right end of the timing tower.
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*Originally published on [Motorsports Global](https://motorsports.global/article/conor-daly-indy-500-open-test-2026-dreyer-reinbold-225-mph-day-one). Visit for full coverage.*
