SONOMA, CA - SEPTEMBER 17: Josef Newgarden of the United States driver of the #2 hum by Verizon Chevrolet celebrates with team owner Roger Penske after bing presented with the Astor Cup for winning the 2017 Verizon IndyCar Series on day 3 of the GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma at Sonoma Raceway on September 17, 2017 in Sonoma, California. (Photo by Lachlan Cunningham/Getty Images)

The IndyCar Series is making another major change for next season


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The IndyCar Series is preparing to make another big change before the 2018 season begins.

One issue that was raised was the randomness of setting qualifying orders on ovals. Teams wanted that adjusted, so there will be a new entrant points system at Phoenix, Texas, Iowa, Gateway and Pocono.

The lottery-style system is being replaced with the entrant points system where the points leader will qualify last, and the driver at the bottom of the points will be first in qualifying.

According to Racer.com, the change was made because front-running drivers have been forced to qualify early, and they've been impacted by green track conditions or unfavorable conditions.

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Moving leaders to the back for qualifying would actually give them better odds of running faster laps.

IndyCar competition director Jay Frye told Racer.com that the change had unanimous support.

"We wanted to eliminate randomness, and a random draw for oval qualifying [order] is as far as you can go in that direction," Frye said. "We could have gone a lot of ways on how to set the order; fastest laps turned by the drivers in the practice before qualifying, but the idea of going off entrant points was the only one that had unanimous support from our teams when we proposed it. So that's what we'll do moving forward."

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The change having unanimous support is a good sign moving forward, and it should improve the overall quality of qualifying for each race.