INDY NXT SERIES: INDY NXT BY FIRESTONE AT MILWAUKEE MILE

August 30, 2026

Jack Beeton

JM Correa

Max Garcia

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Max Garcia, first win, first podium of the season as well.

JM Correa started fourth, comes in second. His first podium of the season.

Jack Beeton, third podium of the season, comes in third.

Max, you get all the cream puff out of your ears?

MAX GARCIA: Not really. Still real stuff.

THE MODERATOR: Can you hear us?

MAX GARCIA: A little bit (smiling).

THE MODERATOR: Congratulations. What do you think? Tell us about the win.

MAX GARCIA: Unbelievable. Yesterday we knew we were setting a race car up, not a quallie car. In practice we were moving through cars pretty good. We qualified 10th. I wasn't so sure about it, but I knew in practice we could get through some cars.

I was pretty confident we could finish a little better than we started. We were just cruising there. Yeah, you're a half second quicker than everyone. I was, All right, might as well go for it.

THE MODERATOR: Win number one. To get something like that is pretty cool.

MAX GARCIA: Yeah, incredible. It just is a testament to all the guys at Abel. We've been through a bunch of stuff this year. We just stayed with it, kept working, kept developing our car. In the end it paid off.

THE MODERATOR: JM, good to see you back on the podium. A lot of talk about the pass towards the end.

JM CORREA: Yeah, it was awesome.

THE MODERATOR: What did you see?

JM CORREA: The restarts were very, very tricky. There was quite a bit of deg today. When the tires are degging that hard, you cool them down, then go again, you're driving on ice.

I kind of learned a bit in the first two restarts and applied that in the third one. Jack gave me an opening. I got a run. I knew it was one chance type of thing. I just sent it. It worked out.

THE MODERATOR: Jack, good to see you back on the podium. Your thoughts on the race. When you had that many restarts, only so many tricks in the bag.

JACK BEETON: On paper it looks a lot more simple than what it was. Started third, finished third. I think it was a bit more to the race than that.

Managed to get up to second early on. Max flew past me like he was the rocket in Mario Kart. Then just managed the tires. I tried to. It was really, really difficult. Sliding everywhere.

Then finally got some restarts at the end. Managed to get through the lap car. I tried to tacking Max. I think I was in the lead for probably five feet maybe.

MAX GARCIA: No, no.

JM CORREA: No, he held on. Had a little battle with JM. The inside was working for me the whole race. I'm going to block there. We stayed side by side. He managed to get around. Well done to him.

A big thank you to everyone on the No. 45 car, HMD Motorsports. We've had a really good weekend. Good to be back after a difficult two races. Looking forward to going into Laguna next weekend.

THE MODERATOR: 208 on-track passes. A lot of action throughout the field.

We'll open it up for questions.

Q. Max, after this rain we had yesterday, also today, how was the grip level on the track? At the end JM came zero point nine seconds. Were you a little bit under panic? The leader Pierson crashed out. Did you push him into aero or he crashed out by himself?

MAX GARCIA: The grip was similar to when we tested here because when we came to test here no one was here for a while. We went back to what worked at the test.

JM got close at the end, but we were kind of just managing. I wanted to get the last four laps done. They told me not to make any mistakes. I was cruising there at the end. It was nice when we're that fast we can do that.

Lastly, we kind of for the some traffic there, me and Pierson. I was pushing him all the way. Stayed within reach of him. I don't know really know. I was putting pressure on him, so I'd like to say it was me that forced him into the mistakes, but I'm not really sure.

Q. Max, in your USF career, you hadn't taken a podium on the ovals. Some of your strongest performances this year have been on ovals. What has made the difference for you this year? How much has it helped having Myles Rowe alongside you at Abel?

MAX GARCIA: I was going to start there by saying Myles has taught me so much this year. He's unbelievable on an oval. Being able to see the data on the first two races, I felt coming here I was confident I could replicate some of it.

We knew we had a good oval car. We were testing strong everywhere. It's easier when we have a really good oval car, you know.

Q. You saw at the end quite a few drivers getting loose on the high line. How much did the track change during the race, especially in the second half?

MAX GARCIA: JM kind of said it. When all the restarts are happening, you're cooling down the tires, heating them back up. They're going through so many heat cycles. It's like driving on ice really.

Obviously a lot less grip from yesterday with all the rain and everything. We have tools in the car. It was staying in front of that knowing maybe this felt like we need to move the tools now, something very big that the team was reminding me of.

JM CORREA: It changed a bit, not massively. I think the grip was so low from the beginning, it was like a reset compared to everything we felt yesterday.

Towards the end I definitely felt the high line was more tricky, there were more marbles. Didn't get sweeped during the yellow flag.

Actually my first restart out of three/four, I almost went into the wall by myself. I got too wide, was trying to get some air, there was no grip. I learned from that.

With the pass with Jack, it was a bit risky to go around the outside, but it stuck.

JACK BEETON: For me I was loose pretty much lap 10 till lap 90. Didn't change too much. I was trying to survive. I think I got it down pretty pat I'd like to think pretty soon.

But yeah, it was just trying to manage the whole race, trying to not end up in a wall. I mean, I survived, so yeah.

Q. Max, it's been a pretty difficult season for you. Performance picked up in the last couple races. How would you assess the progress that you've made through this year?

MAX GARCIA: Yeah, I mean, we've progressed massively through St. Pete. We knew we had to do it. We knew in the off-season it wasn't going to be easy coming into the season. I think we didn't expect it to be this hard.

We knew if we kept working, we had the right guys, really smart engineers that won races and championships before. We had the right mechanics that were willing to work hard for it.

We knew it would take time. We thought it would come a bit sooner, but better late than never.

Q. How did you manage the restarts at the end?

MAX GARCIA: Yeah, I was just trying to keep them guessing. I didn't want to do the same thing twice. I think I did my first and last restart the same. The middle one was different. I was just trying to keep them guessing a bit so I could get a good jump.

Jack stayed close with me on one of them, which I had to defend. I would have liked to have gotten a big jump like the other two, but it was nice having to race someone.

Q. JM, your best oval finish. What has clicked for you this weekend?

JM CORREA: Yeah, we rolled off pretty good from yesterday through practice. I've been doing quite a bit of work at home just watching on-boards, working on the ovals.

I feel like the speed in quallie, that has been okay so far this year, but the race craft, learning how to deal with dirty air, that has been a bit of my weak point. So I did some work at home.

Rolled off pretty good. I was able to apply that in practice. We were able to get through the traffic decently. We knew we had a good package. Then yesterday in quallie, it was solid. It wasn't as good as it could have been, but it was solid.

I did not expect, to be honest, coming into this weekend to be on the podium here. We didn't test well here. We turned it around, had a clean weekend, today made the deg work, made the car work. I was smart with my tires. It worked out for me.

Very happy to do it here on an oval. It's quite funny.

THE MODERATOR: We'll see you guys in a couple days at Laguna Seca.