David Malukas will undergo surgery Tuesday for fractured hand suffered mountain biking

David Malukas will undergo surgery Tuesday afternoon for a fractured hand he suffered mountain biking over the weekend, according to a release from Arrow McLaren on Monday evening. With less than four weeks until IndyCar's 2024 season-opener on the streets of St. Pete (March 10), Malukas' status for his planned debut with Arrow McLaren is uncertain.

According to a team official, Arrow McLaren hopes to have a timetable for Malukas' return shortly after the surgery, but the severity of the injury – and the length of time he'll be forced to sit – was not immediately clear. Before Malukas season-opening practice in St. Pete on March 8, Arrow McLaren has two tests – a manufacturer hybrid test the week of Feb. 20, and a full-field test the following week at Sebring.

Whether the team will call in a substitute driver for Malukas' testing slots, or merely rely more on Arrow McLaren teammates Alexander Rossi and Pato O'Ward is unclear. Should the third-year IndyCar driver need four weeks or more to recover, though, Arrow McLaren officials are expected to explore a variety of options to temporarily fill his seat for St. Pete, as well as the $1 Million Challenge two weeks afterwards at The Thermal Club March 24.

Among the team's options Callum Ilott, Conor Daly and Jack Harvey all raced full-time a year ago and would seem to stand out among the recent class of drivers currently on the sidelines. Harvey, though, tested recently for Dale Coyne Racing and may step into at least a part-time role with the team that is yet to fill either of its 2024 full-time rides.

Daly was recently confirmed for an Indianapolis 500-only ride with Dreyer and Reinbold Racing, and he served last year as a substitute for Meyer Shank Racing (in place of the injured Simon Pagenaud) and Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (after they parted with Harvey). Ilott was on Arrow McLaren leadership's radar to fill the void left by Alex Palou staying in his championship-winning ride at Chip Ganassi Racing last August, before Zak Brown, Gavin Ward, Tony Kanaan and company ultimately hired Malukas.

After splitting with Juncos Hollinger Racing in late October following a sometimes-tenuous 2023 campaign, Ilott landed a 2024 full-season ride in the World Endurance Championship with the Hertz Team Jota Porsche Hypercar squad. He will race the team's No. 12 with Will Stevens and Norman Nato. Ilott's WEC schedule begins with the series prologue Feb. 24-25 before the season-opening round March 2.

Ilott had previously stated he planned to attend multiple IndyCar races this season, even without a ride, with an eye on 2025. A message to Ilott on Monday evening regarding his availability to race in St. Pete following his WEC opener was not immediately returned.

Arrow McLaren officials, though, could also look within the organization to fill the potential void. Ex-Andretti Global IndyCar driver Zach Veach has recently logged time in the simulator for the team while also serving as a frequent spotter on race weekends. He last raced in IndyCar at Mid-Ohio in the fall of 2020 before his split with Andretti.

Though he's claimed to have run his final IndyCar race -- a claim he, admittedly has gone back on before -- Brown and Ward could also opt to call upon Kanaan, the team's 49-year-old sporting director who last year ran his 22nd and final Indianapolis 500 in what was planned to be his first and last race in the cockpit with the team. He then was kept on as a 'special advisor' through the rest of the season before being promoted to his current role this offseason, with Ward elevated from 'racing director' to 'team principal'.

Having last raced an Indy car on a street course at Toronto in 2019, Kanaan would have the benefit of the late-February Sebring test to help him shake off the rust from four years of strictly racing ovals in IndyCar. Of note, Kanaan has an extensive history with NTT Data, the one of the primary sponsors this year on Malukas' No. 6 Chevy, dating back to his final three full-time seasons with Chip Ganassi Racing (2015-17). The company stuck with the No. 10 Honda through the end of the 2022 IndyCar campaign before its switch to Arrow McLaren for the start of 2023, when it had expected to be aligned with the first of Palou's two now-aborted jumps from Ganassi to Arrow McLaren.

In two of IndyCar's most recent instances of drivers suffering broken bones in their hands, both drivers (Jimmie Johnson and Callum Ilott) spent well under a month outside the cockpit. Johnson, in fact, pushed through an entire race weekend at Long Beach in April of 2022 after suffering a fracture during Friday practice. He was affixed with a brace, but managed to compete in practice, qualifying and the race -- weathering two more crashes in the process. Johnson underwent surgery early that next week, but was cleared to test on the IMS oval just over a week later.

Just over a month later, Ilott broke his hand during a crash in his 500 debut and was held out of the following weekend's street race at Belle Isle, but was then cleared to race two weeks after the crash for the weekend at Road America.

On the other end of the spectrum, ex-McLaren Formula 1 driver Daniel Ricciardo missed five races and spent nearly two months out of the cockpit last season after breaking his hand during practice at Zandvoort during the Dutch Grand Prix weekend Aug. 25. Just two races into his return to Alpha Tauri, Ricciardo would miss a trio of September races in Italy, Singapore and Japan, as well as the Qatar Grand Prix in early-October before making his return in the U.S. Grand Prix Oct. 22.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: IndyCar: David Malukas suffered fractured hand mountain biking