McLaren CEO Zak Brown says he wants to see the team compete at the Indy 500 "every year", not just at this year's edition with Fernando Alonso.
Alonso is being allowed to miss the Monaco Grand Prix on May 28 to compete in a McLaren entry, powered by Honda and run by Andretti Autosport, at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Newly-installed CEO Brown was the architect behind the move as he plans to expand the iconic team's racing portfolio in the coming years.
Brown insists he does not view Alonso's participation as a one-off.
"I would like to see McLaren-Honda competing at Indianapolis every year," Brown said. "Originally I thought this was an idea we could pursue in 2018 and given the circumstances of how we are running in Formula One right now, and Fernando's desire and our desire, and Honda's desire, this created a very, very small window of opportunity that we jumped on.
"McLaren is a big fan of IndyCar racing, we think it's fantastic motorsports and I've personally been around it my whole life so I'm very excited on a personal level to be here. And we had just enough time to do this very properly. When I called Mark [Miles, CEO of IndyCar], and ultimately Michael [Andretti, Andretti Autosport boss] it was good that he was already far down the road with the car, because we need to be competitive. The whole idea is to run at the front of the field."
Brown travelled with Alonso to Alabama's Barber Motorsports Park at the weekend for the IndyCar round, meeting with Andretti Autosport and giving the Spaniard the chance to sit in a car for the first time. With Alonso due to have a private test on May 3, several days after the Russian Grand Prix, Brown says the team is doing everything to ensure the Spaniard gets the maximum amount of experience for the event.
"We have good preparation. We've brought in [2003 Indy 500 winner] Gil de Ferran to assist Fernando in learning his way around Indianapolis.
Yeah, I'd like to see McLaren here on a more regular basis. And would we do it with Fernando again? Absolutely. I hope that we have the problem of Monaco and Indy in the same weekend and we are fighting for the championship.
"So what happens in 2018? We'll have to wait and see, because obviously we're working very hard to get Fernando and Stoffel Vandoorne a much more competitive [Formula One] car than we are producing right now."