Alex Palou – Page 2 – Syndication Server

Doubled stakes for IndyCar title contenders at Milwaukee Mile

NTT IndyCar Series championship leader Alex Palou will be crowned if he can push his lead to 55 points by the end of Sunday. If his closest title rival Will Power can overtake Palou by the end of the Milwaukee Hy-Vee 250 doubleheader, a fun fight will move to the season finale at Nashville Speedway where he’ll give everything he has to become IndyCar’s newest title winner.

And while third-place Colton Herta and fourth-place Scott McLaughlin have a remote chance of vaulting past them to earn the championship, the odds favor the top two aces in the drivers’ standings to achieve a rare feat: Across 100-plus years of IndyCar racing, only 12 drivers have won three or more championships, and with Palou and Power, the run from Milwaukee through Nashville is primed to add a new member to the club.

The race for three is officially on, but the odds are by no means equal as with three races to run, Power is short on time to draw down Palou’s lead prior to the final checkered flag of the season that waves in Tennessee on Sept. 15. To start, Palou holds a 54-point lead over Power, which is the equivalent to a maximum race of points in his favor (50 points for a win, one point for pole position, one for leading a lap, and two for leading the most laps).

There are many ways the Team Penske driver can catch and pass the Chip Ganassi Racing standard bearer, which begins by earning an average of 19-20 points more than Palou at each race. Without getting into bonus points for pole and the rest, Power could take the championship with three wins at 50 points apiece and Palou finishing no better than fifth in each race (30 points).

But that’s a lot to ask of Power to win four races — including last weekend in Portland — in a row. If Power places second at the last three with 40 points apiece, he’d need Palou to finish no higher than 10th each time (20 points), and that would be uncharacteristic for IndyCar’s most consistent driver. If Power delivers a trio of thirds (35 points per race), he’d need Palou to come home in 15th (15 points), which seems unlikely.

The greatest problem facing Power, and Herta (67 points back), and McLaughlin (a dire 88 points down) is Palou’s aforementioned dependability. From the 14 races completed this season, Palou has 12 finishes of fifth or better. Said another way, Palou’s only had two poor results from 14 tries; that’s a top-five delivery rate of 86 percent, and now his rivals need him to trip and stumble a few more times in consecutive events, which isn’t his forté.

It’s the crushing consistency that makes Palou a perennial title threat and someone who rarely accommodates the needs of a Power, Herta, or McLaughlin by having one bad finish after another.

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One of Palou’s rough oval results was at the first Iowa race where he crashed on his own while running 11th and he was credited with 23rd at the finish, so it’s not impossible for the Ganassi driver to fall short at least once at Milwaukee or Nashville. But two or three times? That would be uncharted territory for Palou.

The other issue facing Power and the other contenders is Palou’s underappreciated rise in oval competitiveness. He was fifth at the Indianapolis 500, crashed at Iowa 1 but shook it off and rebounded the next day to take second at Iowa 2, and placed fourth at the last oval at World Wide Technology Raceway. He’s still chasing his first oval win, and Penske is expected to continue its oval dominance at the final three races, but Palou’s average oval finishing position is 3.6 when he reaches the checkered flag — and he almost always reaches the checkered flag. Reinforcing the point, Palou finished every oval race in 2023 and did so with an average result of fifth.

Power needs to win and win and win and hope Palou doesn’t stick to his oval average of 3.6, or even 5.0 at the finish lines, because if he does, there’s nothing the Penske driver, or Herta at Andretti Global, or Penske’s McLaughlin can do to prevent him from becoming a three-timer.

With 54 points on Palou’s side, the settling of the championship isn’t centered on how well Power and the rest perform. For the pursuers to have realistic shots at the title, Milwaukee 1, Milwaukee 2 and Nashville will be about Palou and whether he’s struck with adversity. For them to win, he needs to fail. Minus the adversity, Palou is on the way to claiming his third championship in five seasons.

In the Rookie of the Year standings, it will be a Ganassi driver winning the award, and with Linus Lundqvist sitting on a 64-point margin over Kyffin Simpson, Lundqvist in total control.

Sting Ray Robb has put Foyt’s No. 41 into the top 22, and his oval form augurs well for his chances of keeping it there. Josh Tons/Motorsport Images

The fascinating squabble to secure Penske Entertainment’s final Leaders Circle contracts — which split the bulk of the season’s prize money into 22 equal contracts worth approximately $1 million apiece for those who finish in the top 22 of the entrants’ championship — is getting down to business time. Landing in Milwaukee, the cluster of teams on the right side and wrong side of the top 22 threshold has evolved.

The No. 66 Meyer Shank Racing Honda driven by David Malukas went into Portland in 19th with 154 points and left in 19th with 164. Barring a dramatic downward turn, Shank’s call to park Tom Blomqvist, hire Malukas and get the No. 66 into the green with the Leaders Circle has worked. Credit is also due to Sting Ray Robb, who took the No. 41 A.J. Foyt Racing Chevy from 21st to 20th (156 points) entering the ovals where he’s particularly solid.

Tied at 156 points, but behind the No. 41 Chevy, is the No. 30 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda, which went to Portland in 20th with Pietro Fittipaldi and exited in 21st after a punishing race.

In 22nd, it’s the No. 20 Ed Carpenter Racing Chevy, which holds its spot on the bubble (141 points). In 23rd and tied on points at 141, Conor Daly in the No. 78 Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevy is locked in a battle with Christian Rasmussen in the No. 20 ECR car — his former ride — to claim the last contract.

Of the many plot lines to follow this weekend, the ECR vs JHR, Rasmussen vs Daly thread is a big one.

Last again among Leaders Circle contenders in 24th is the No. 51 Dale Coyne Racing Honda (133 points), but it wouldn’t take much for Katherine Legge to join the ECR vs JHR scrap if she has a strong showing in Milwaukee. Coyne’s No. 18 Honda remains a distant 25th (107 points).

Tire life gave Power the edge in Portland showdown

The ongoing volley between Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing at Portland International Raceway went in favor of Penske drivers for the third time in the last five years at the circuit, breaking the tie between the NTT IndyCar Series’ two dominant …

In 2019 it was Penske’s Will Power, and upon the race’s 2021 return from a COVID-affected 2020, it was Ganassi’s Alex Palou who stood atop the podium. In 2022, it was Penske’s Scott McLaughlin, and in 2023, it was Palou again for Ganassi. And with Power’s romp to a demonstrative win on Sunday at the BitNile.com Grand Prix of Portland, the deciding factor in his 9.8-second victory over Palou was tire longevity.

Whether it was new or used Firestone primaries or alternates, Power’s No. 12 Chevy had better traction in all phases of the lap – accelerating, braking, and turning – for the entirety of his four stints. Palou wasn’t as fortunate as his tires, new or used, and of either compound, lacked the chassis setup to match Power’s pace as the stints continued.

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The knockout punch came on the final pit stop, when Power’s race strategist Ron Ruzewski saved a fresh set of the faster alternates while Palou, who’d used his on the third stint to no avail, spent the race’s final stanza on slower used primaries. Power drove off into the horizon and left his main championship rival to settle for a distant second.

“I think we didn’t really pick the right choices on tires,” Palou said. “But it comes from qualifying. We didn’t really think that the used alternates were going to last. Used both of them in qualifying. Yeah, a shame that we couldn’t really battle much. At the beginning I thought we had a lot of pace when the 12 [was] on primaries. I was really comfortable.

“But as soon as Will went on [alternates], I just couldn’t really follow him. I had a chance on the back straight when he had a little bit of traffic, but couldn’t really make it. So yeah, happy, but obviously a little bit frustrating that we couldn’t really get there. It was tough. Like, our pace was not at his level today. I think he had a seventh gear today. Couldn’t really catch him.”

Power had Palou draw near on a couple occasions when they were about to lap tailenders, but other than those moments, the Penske veteran was able to reestablish a safe margin over the Ganassi ace.

“I had traffic; I was at the mercy of the pace of the car in front,” Power said. “I saw that gap just shrink really quickly. I think he pulled into the pits or I passed. However that played out. As soon as I got clear track, I knew I could put quite a bit of time into him. Especially at the end of the stint, it seemed like his car used the tire more than ours.

“On [alternates] we were simply better. Our car was really good on [alternate] tires. Yeah, kind of equal, I’d say, [on primaries]. He even looked like he dropped off on [primaries]. It was really a lot to do with traffic management. If it was a clear track for me, I always felt I could pull a gap on him.”

Palou’s championship strategy? No letup

NTT IndyCar Series championship leader Alex Palou has a prime opportunity to place more distance between himself and those who are still within reach of the Spaniard with four races left on the calendar. The Chip Ganassi Racing driver, who starts …

The Chip Ganassi Racing driver, who starts third for today’s 110-lap BitNile.com Grand Prix of Portland, has 59 points over his closest championship challenger Colton Herta who starts eighth, 65 points on third-place teammate Scott Dixon who starts ninth, and an advantage of 66 points over fourth-place Will Power, who starts second. But 59 points might not be enough to keep his fiercest rivals at bay.

Heading into three ovals to close the season, Palou has one last chance to use his immense road racing skills to his benefit; Team Penske’s Power — Scott McLaughlin, who sits fifth in the standings with a 73-point deficit and starts 20th — and Josef Newgarden are expected to carve into Palou’s lead once the closing ovals arrive.

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“You don’t want to go out already thinking that you just want to be finishing top fives, and points racing, because that’s when issues come,” Palou told RACER of his strategy for Portland, the Milwaukee doubleheader, and the championship finale at Nashville. “When you start changing the way you drive, the way you race, it’s not natural. And also that goes for strategies. If you start going for, ‘Let’s do a safe strategy and maybe lose only two spots and be P6,’ then you’re back there in the race and you start going farther back.”

Intelligent aggression is the formula Palou plans to use in the No. 10 Honda.

“I still want to race 100 percent and go for wins,” he said. “I think also having a little bit bigger margin allows us to be like, ‘Hey, we can go for it and try and win it,’ but at the same time, I won’t be going crazy into Turn 1 and crashing. I think we’re in a good mindset of going as hard as we can without going crazy.”

Rough Toronto qualifying leaves IndyCar title contenders struggling

With a tight championship battle winding down, the last thing IndyCar’s title contenders needed was to have a rough afternoon of qualifying for Sunday’s 85-lap Ontario Honda Dealers Indy Toronto race. The narrow and bumpy 11-turn, 1.8-mile street …

The narrow and bumpy 11-turn, 1.8-mile street course does provide a few well-used passing opportunities throughout each lap, and most of the top six in the drivers’ standings will need to get creative if they are going to dig themselves out of the starting position holes they’re in.

Entering the event, Alex Palou leads the championship followed by Will Power, Pato O’Ward, Scott Dixon, Scott McLaughlin, and Colton Herta, and of the six, Palou has the longest distance to travel after being relegated to start 18th after being penalized for blocking O’Ward.

Nearby, an unhappy O’Ward starts 14th, Dixon rolls off 15th, and in a slightly more favorable situation, Power will head to the green flag in ninth. Only Herta, with his 14th career pole, and McLaughlin, in fifth, are starting where they are normally found.

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Palou’s blocking call, which pulled him out of competing in the Firestone Fast 12 session and a chance at going for pole, left the smiley defending series champion with a stone-face demeanor after the penalty was assessed.

“We need to look at that,” the Chip Ganassi Racing driver said. “I do not agree at the moment. I need to check it. I had three cars in front of me — couldn’t really go anywhere. I was out already for one lap, unlike the cars that were in front of me, so yeah, do not agree, but this is what it is.”

The Spaniard knows he has a lot of ground to recover if he wants to earn meaningful points in the race, but hasn’t lost confidence.

“It doesn’t help, for sure, but we have a fast car,” Palou said. “As long as we have a fast car, [we’ll] be able to move.”

O’Ward needed some time to decompress after climbing from his car.

“It’s been a tough weekend,” he said. “Obviously, qualifying was really frustrating with cars getting in the way right in the peak of the window of the tires to be able to transfer. We were less than a tenth and a half to transfer, so I think we would have been okay without those implications.

“It is frustrating, knowing that we could have started further up, but we will be rolling off P14. Historically, this hasn’t been one of our best tracks. It will be a tough one, but we will give it our best and see what the No. 5 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet can do.”

Iowa Race 1 shuffles championship order behind Palou

Alex Palou’s worst finish in more than two years could have done major damage to his quest to win a third NTT IndyCar Series championship. A sequence of errors by the Spaniard turned what could have been a great day after qualifying and running third, but stalling his No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda at the first round of pit stops sent him towards the back of the field. Late in the race, he spun on his own and crashed, which is a rarity for the reigning champion, but it did leave him 23rd at the finish.

The last time things went this bad, it was June of 2022 at Road America — 38 races ago — where he placed 27th after clashing with former teammate Marcus Ericsson, and in a normal race, his lowly finishing position would have been harmful in the drivers’ standings. But thanks to the poor result from Team Penske’s Will Power, who held second entering Iowa with a deficit of 48 points, and left the first race in third after falling to 18th at the checkered flag, Palou’s lead didn’t take much of a hit.

It’s been cut to 36 points by the new second-place driver Pato O’Ward from Arrow McLaren, who won last weekend in Mid-Ohio and was runner-up Saturday night in Iowa. Power’s back to third, but closer to Palou at 43 points down.

“It’s done,” Palou told RACER of putting the bad day to rest. “We lost nine points to P2. The P2 guy (Power) moved and everybody stretched out. It’s only nine points smaller, but it was a terrible day for us. That doesn’t mean that I’m happy and only looking at points, but looking at the positive, the results that we had from the last couple of races gave us the opportunity to do a really terrible day.

“If I had to wait three weeks for the next race, I would have probably tortured myself a little bit more. But I have a race tomorrow, and I’m starting with a great car. So it’s done. I did two terrible mistakes, and it’s best to move on and not make those mistakes again.”

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And where the hybrid racing goods took from Scott Dixon at Mid-Ohio, who fell from third in the standings to fifth and 71 points shy of Palou when his energy recovery system malfunctioned and left him 27th and last, they gave back in Race 1 where Dixon finished fourth, improved to fourth in the championship, and cut the gap to his teammate Palou to 46 points.

The other major shift in the run for the title was with Race 1 victor Scott McLaughlin, who arrived in Iowa a distant eighth in the standings and 105 points shy of Palou.

His dominant win, which added three bonus points on top of the 50 he earned for the win, vaulted McLaughlin to fifth in the standings. He also slashed the margin to the championship leader to 58 points, and with his form and the pole for Race 2, more headway could be made if another podium result is produced.

Palou masters IndyCar’s hybrid system en route to Mid-Ohio pole

The first pole in IndyCar’s hybrid era belongs to Chip Ganassi Racing and Alex Palou, who secured his second consecutive pole with the No. 10 Honda and the Spaniard’s third of the season. Palou’s final lap produced a 1m05.3511s tour, and behind him, …

The first pole in IndyCar’s hybrid era belongs to Chip Ganassi Racing and Alex Palou, who secured his second consecutive pole with the No. 10 Honda and the Spaniard’s third of the season.

Palou’s final lap produced a 1m05.3511s tour, and behind him, Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward was charging, with the No. 5 Chevy showing as being slightly faster than his rival, but a slight loss of speed in the final corners left the Mexican an impossibly small 0.0024s behind in second.

“We knew we had a really fast car,” said Palou, who added one more point to his championship lead. “It’s gonna look good on the front row, and it was nice two weeks ago so we wanted to repeat.”

O’Ward was understandably disappointed to have missed out on pole by a tiny margin.

“There’s always more, right?” he said. “That was a really clean lap. This is the strongest car that we’ve had all year in a race weekend, so I’m really excited for tomorrow, and we’re obviously the ones chasing. It’s always a good thing to have a carrot in front of you, and we’ll see if we can get it tomorrow.”

The greatest story from qualifying belonged to Meyer Shank Racing and newcomer David Malukas, who fired the No. 66 Honda into third (+0.2998s) ahead of Andretti Global’s Colton Herta in the No. 26 Honda (+0.4142s), Ganassi’s Marcus Armstrong in the No. 11 Honda (0.5891s) who will drop to 11th after serving a grid penalty for an unapproved engine change, and Andretti’s Marcus Ericsson in the No. 28 Honda (+0.6081s) as the sponsor of the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio claimed five of the top six positions.

Behind Ericsson, the first of the Team Penske drivers (Scott McLaughlin) slotted in seventh on a strange afternoon for the perennial contenders.

“The driver sucks,” McLaughlin jokingly said. “Just made a mistake on the first lap. We should have been easily in the Fast Six.”

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Where McLaughlin did well, his teammates were surprising omissions from the Fast 12 as Will Power, who holds second in the championship, qualified 16th and teammate Josef Newgarden earned 18th on the grid, one spot behind Arrow McLaren rookie Nolan Siegel.

Another surprise in qualifying came with 2023 Indy NXT champion Christian Rasmussen, who took the No. 20 Ed Carpenter Racing Chevy to ninth, right behind Arrow McLaren’s Alexander Rossi and in front of Rossi’s impending replacement, Christian Lundgaard.

Dale Coyne Racing’s Toby Sowery, making his IndyCar debut, got a single lap at speed after an energy recovery system issue kept his No. 51 Dale Coyne Racing Honda on pit lane for most of the opening session, but he was able to secure 25th on the grid.

The opening stage of knockout qualifying pitted 13 of the 27 drivers against each other to earn six transfer spots — Palou, Malukas, Rossi, McLaughlin, Rasmussen and Ericsson advanced.

Behind them, the remaining drivers were locked into their starting positions, beginning with Felix Rosenqvist (P13), who will lose six spots on the final grid after an unapproved engine change, Kyle Kirkwood (P15), Siegel (P17), Graham Rahal (P19), Santino Ferrucci (P21), Pietro Fittipaldi (P23, also with a six-spot grid penalty), and Sowery (P25), who lost precious time on pit lane while his team worked through a energy recovery system problem.

The second phase of the knockout process saw its 14 drivers separated into a top six headed by Armstrong (also with an upcoming six-position grid penalty), Herta, Lundgaard, O’Ward, Linus Lundqvist, and Romain Grosjean.

On the outside looking in were Dixon (P14), Power (P16), Newgarden (P18), Rinus VeeKay (P20), Agustin Canapino (P22), Kyffin Simpson (P24), Sting Ray Robb (P26) and Jack Harvey (P27).

RESULTS

Palou leads first session of IndyCar hybrid era at Mid-Ohio

The NTT IndyCar Series’ hybrid era opened with rookie Toby Sowery doing most of the lapping on his own in dry and overcast conditions to start on Friday at Mid-Ohio and ended with Alex Palou on top and rain limiting the running in the final 20 …

The new energy recovery systems made in partnership between Chevrolet and Honda performed as expected, with no major issues surfacing during the afternoon.

Palou delivered a 1m07.0650s lap in the No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda, which was well clear of Arrow McLaren’s Alexander Rossi who ran second in the No. 7 Chevy with a 1m07.5093s tour. Ganassi’s Marcus Armstrong was third with a 1m07.5442s in the No. 11 Honda.

“It was very valuable,” Armstrong said of the dry running in the heavier hybrid car on the new Mid-Ohio pavement. “It’s a new track surface here. It seems to be pretty grippy and smooth. So I was happy with the car — the car felt really good, considering there’s 105 lbs more of weight and quite a rearward weight distribution. It should have felt a lot more different than it did, but overall, I was happy with it, and good potential for tomorrow.”

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Timing of the rain meant teams didn’t get a chance to head out on Firestone’s faster red alternate tires — which are only available to try in the first practice session — to perform qualifying simulations. As a result, qualifying could be an unpredictable affair and deliver results that stray from expectation. The handful of quick times that were set by Palou and the rest came on the slower primary tires as the rain prevented anyone from setting a representative lap at ultimate speed.

Led by Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward, a few drivers went out to explore the newly-paved track surface on rain tires, but they were scrambling for grip and lapped more than 20 seconds off of the primary tire pace until the checkered flag emerged.

Applaud the effort, @PatricioOWard 😅

📺: #INDYCAR practice on Peacock pic.twitter.com/mTthUT55Ta

— NTT INDYCAR SERIES (@IndyCar) July 5, 2024

The 75-minute session was clean to start, barring a harmless spin by Josef Newgarden, until the clock wound down to 50 minutes when a fire in the engine bay of Agustin Canapino’s car — which extinguished itself — led to a red flag after the car rolled to a stop.

At the time of the red, Graham Rahal was fastest at a 1m07.7452s. It took almost 15 minutes to return to green, and with 36 minutes left, cars rolled out as light sprinkles fell in some areas. O’Ward moved to second with a 1m07.8407s, and Colton Herta and Armstrong moved ahead of Rahal in rapid succession, and then it was Palou who went to first with a 1m07.0650s.

At the same time Palou went to P1, Armstrong went off and stalled as the rain started to pick up. Jack Harvey also spun and a second red flag was required to deal with two stranded cars at the 26-minutes-to-go mark.

The green flag waved at 21 minutes, but with the heavier rain, and no expectation for more rain for the rest of the weekend, most of the 27-car field chose to stay on pit lane until the session expired.

UP NEXT: Practice 2, Saturday morning, 10:50-11:50 a.m. ET, on Peacock.

RESULTS

‘We were lucky to have a really big pace advantage’ – Palou

Alex Palou gave major props to the Chip Ganassi Racing team for giving him the best car in the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey, but admits he felt his pit strategy was “risky” and that he should have done a better job in the first stint. Palou, who …

Palou, who took pole position using two sets of red tires in the Firestone Fast Six, lost his advantage at Turn 2, lap 1, when Kyle Kirkwood’s Andretti Autosport Honda passed him for the lead around the outside. Palou then spent the remainder of that first stint trailing Kirkwood.

Although he stayed out a lap longer than Kirkwood and delivered a strong enough in-lap to jump ahead of the Andretti driver, he came out behind Alexander Rossi, who had also stopped a lap earlier and delivered his fastest lap of the race. Having changed to a second set of primaries, he was also vulnerable to Kirkwood and his teammate Colton Herta, who were both on the softer alternates, and sure enough, they passed him through the Turn 2 and 3 sequence next time by.

To get him back to the front, the team left him out front when the first caution fell on lap 36, whereas his primary threats all pitted for a second time. Although Palou worked hard when the green flag flew, he hadn’t quite pulled a big enough lead on his fuel-saving rivals to retain the lead when he made his second stop on lap 55. However, he passed Rossi’s Arrow McLaren on lap 62, and Herta on lap 64.

Thereafter, he was troubled only by the threat of Herta on restarts.

“I did a mistake, played it too nice, lost the lead,” said the two-time and defending series champion of the start. “At the beginning of the race, I wasn’t really executing. The car was really fast but I couldn’t overtake Kyle. That kind of put us in a bad position. Yeah, I was not really happy with myself at the beginning. The team had to do a really risky strategy, too risky in my opinion.

“It worked out so I’m really happy. Sometimes you need a little bit of luck. It was not luck. Honestly, we just stayed out. We were obviously putting ourselves in danger if there was a yellow. We’re just losing all the gap we’re doing against Colton at the time.”

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Palou said that although he has faith in his strategist Barry Wanser, he did question whether they had made the right move of staying out when others pitted.

“I understand what he did,” said Palou, for whom this was an 11th IndyCar victory. “Obviously it’s not the preferred strategy. I doubted a little bit at the beginning. At the same time I knew they know a lot more the numbers. They had trust in me on going fast.

“I have a lot of faith. As a driver, you always doubt everything. Just in case it goes wrong, I can say, ‘I knew it!’ When I saw everybody coming in, ‘Are we sure this is a good one?’ If it didn’t go well, I could say, I told you. If it went well, I could say, Yeah, you did a good job!”

“I knew it was risky just in case we did, like, five laps, pull a gap. I know we were going to pull a gap. Imagine we have eight seconds ahead, then there’s a caution, we’re done. We have to make an extra pit stop to everybody. We’re going to be in the back of the queue. We’re not going to have any way to overtake 10, 15 cars. That’s why it was a bit risky…

“I think as a driver you cannot really doubt all the time what they are doing, especially with the past I’ve had with Barry and everybody calling the strategies. They’ve been calling 99.9%. Every time it’s been amazing.”

Asked how he had been able to track Kirkwood so closely in the first stint without having his tires degrade in the dirty air, Palou explained: “I think it was just because we were lucky to have a really big pace advantage this time. Normally it’s bad to be so close, but in my opinion, we were running super slow and I was not even pushing too much on the tires.

“There’s other races where, yeah, you need to leave a gap of 1.5 seconds, to leave your tires to breathe, your downforce to work. But yeah, my car was superior here, and I could stay close. It wasn’t good for the tires. At the end I was struggling, as well. But he was struggling a little bit more.”

“I was surprised that he was not pushing at the beginning. He was, like, kind of saving a bit of fuel, even before the tire deg was an issue. I knew that the best thing for us was to go as fast as possible. That’s why I was trying to overtake him, which I didn’t make happen.”

Firestone GP of Monterey, Sunday – Race recap with winner Alex Palou

Chip Ganassi Racing ace Alex Palou produced another champion performance at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca to deliver his second win of the 2024 NTT IndyCar Series championship, beating Colton Herta and Alexander Rossi to score his 11th career win …

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Palou fires back into IndyCar points lead with wild win at Laguna Seca

Alex Palou won the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey, beating Colton Herta after a torrid 95 laps of the 2.238-mile WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca and has moved into the lead of the championship on a day when former leader Will Power finished …

From pole position, Palou’s Chip Ganassi Racing Honda made a strong start but Andretti Global’s Kyle Kirkwood outbraked him and passed him around the outside into Turn 2 to grab the lead and the inside line for Turn 3. Behind Palou, Felix Rosenqvist retained third place for Meyer Shank Racing, chased by Alexander Rossi’s Arrow McLaren who had scrambled past Colton Herta’s Andretti Global Honda on the outside of Turn 3.

The big loser on the opening lap was Power who got hung out on the dusty outside through Turn 3 and fell into the dirt, dropping from to 25th. By contrast, Ganassi’s Scott Dixon jumped up from 10th to seventh behind Christian Lundgaard’s Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda, and ahead of Scott McLaughlin, despite the Penske No. 3 being the highest-starting car running the Firestone alternates. At the start of the second lap, Marcus Armstrong muscled Romain Grosjean aside at Turn 2 to claim ninth and immediately closed on McLaughlin.

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On lap six, Rinus VeeKay spun behind his Ed Carpenter Racing teammate Christian Rasmussen and fell to the back. At this stage, Palou was still chasing Kirkwood hard, 0.8s behind him, and pulling clear of Rosenqvist, Rossi, Herta and Lundgaard. By lap 13, Palou was filling Kirkwood’s mirrors and Rosenqvist was within a second of the Ganassi machine.

Regarding pit stops, Marcus Ericsson was the first to blink, switching from primaries to alternates at the end of lap 17. Power stopped at the end of lap 18, making the same move from blacks to reds. Pato O’Ward, who had been running 12th, pitted next time by and went for fresh reds. McLaughlin changed his reds for more used reds.

By lap 22, Kirkwood was clinging onto the lead by his fingernails and his lap times were down to 1m11.0778s, while Rossi was into pitlane to change primaries for alternates, a move Rosenqvist emulated next time by. Kirkwood, Herta and Lundgaard all pitted next time by but their slower laps on worn tires meant they were beaten by Rossi. Palou’s extra lap on track was enough for him to jump Kirkwood, but not Rossi. Surprisingly, the two-time champion had taken on another set of primaries, and Kirkwood and Herta wasted little time in passing him.

Further back, the charging McLaughlin dived down the inside of Lundgaard at Turn 9, and the RLL car went off into the gravel, collecting an advertising board which folded around his right-front wing.

Rosenqvist was another who had lost time in gravel, up the hill to the Corkscrew, and now ran ninth. Josef Newgarden had lost time when he was served a drive-through penalty for an unsafe pit exit. However, although he dropped to 24th, his time loss was reduced by Luca Ghiotto shunting his Dale Coyne Racing Honda and bringing out the first yellow flag of the race.

Newgarden leapt to 11th when several drivers elected to use the caution to make their second stop, including Rossi, Kirkwood and Herta. Dixon bounced off a curb at pit entry and struck the pit wall with his right front, and McLaughlin tagged the Ganassi car’s left rear. Palou stayed out on his primaries, and O’Ward on alternates moved up to second, but was passed at Turn 2 on the lap 39 restart by Grosjean, who hung round the outside on fresh primaries and made the move stick.

David Malukas ran fourth in his first race of the year for Meyer Shank, followed by Armstrong and Ferrucci. Mid-pack, Herta’s crew had jumped him ahead of Rossi and Kirkwood. The race then went under yellow for two laps as Nolan Siegel spun and needed a bump start.

The lap 42 restart saw Palou stretch away from Grosjean, O’Ward and Malukas, clearly needing two more stops, whereas those who pitted under caution were expected to be able to make it on one.

O’Ward pitted from third at the end of lap 47, and Malukas and Pietro Fittipaldi (RLL) stopped next time by, but Fittipaldi made the same error as Newgarden, running onto the sand on the pit exit and missing the blend line, and pitted.

Palou was now soaring relative to Herta – who led the group on the other strategy – pulling 22s on him before Palou’s lap 54 stop, as Herta tried to make his fuel number. Palou didn’t get quite enough of a gap to retain the lead, but he emerged in third behind Herta and Rossi and just ahead of Kirkwood. Behind them ran McLaughlin, Dixon, Power, Grosjean, Rosenqvist and Lundgaard.

Power on alternates took Dixon on primaries down the inside at the top of the Corkscrew to claim sixth on lap 58, so he could start pursuing his teammate McLaughlin.

Nearer the front, Palou dived down the inside of Rossi at Turn 2 on lap 62 to claim second, and rapidly closed on Herta, while Power passed McLaughlin for fifth a lap later. On lap 64 Palou drafted Herta up the hill out of Turn 6 and was well ahead by the time they reached turn in for the Corkscrew. Herta had no respite, because immediately Rossi was in his mirrors.

Kirkwood and Dixon made their final stops on lap 66, and then Herta, Rossi, Power, McLaughlin, Lundgaard and Rosenqvist pitted. Palou again stayed out longer and turned his fastest lap of the race, but then got stuck behind Rasmussen for half a lap and lost 3s. At the end of lap 70, Ganassi called him to the pits where he took on primaries and emerged ahead of Herta. Grosjean, who had pitted on the same lap as Palou, didn’t have enough temperature in his tires to fend off Rossi at the top of the Corkscrew and potentially lost a podium.

The caution flags flew on lap 75, when Lundgaard went up the inside of Armstrong at Turn 4 who had just emerged from the pits and nuzzled him to the outside. The green Ganassi car spun and stalled.

IndyCar then allowed everyone to pit before throwing the caution, and off-strategy Newgarden was able to pit from the lead and emerge in second, ahead of Herta, Rossi, Grosjean and Power.

At the restart, Palou held onto the lead but there was a double hit for Penske. Newgarden ran off the track at Turn 6, allowing Herta, Rossi and Grosjean ahead, while at Turn 5, McLaughlin made a late dive on Power, bounced him wide but then spun himself as he went back to the throttle. Before he could serve his drivethrough penalty, his car was seen struggling up the hill very slowly and he had to pit. There was then a fourth caution for Jack Harvey’s Dale Coyne Racing Honda expiring on the main straight, even though Harvey backed it off the track into pitlane.

Things are getting WILD in the closing laps!

📺: #FirestoneGP on CNBC and Peacock pic.twitter.com/4wR6yoV2p8

— NTT INDYCAR SERIES (@IndyCar) June 24, 2024

Palou held off Herta on the lap 86 restart, while Rossi and Grosjean were pursued by Newgarden, Kirkwood, Dixon, O’Ward, Power and Ferrucci. The fifth caution didn’t take long in coming – lap 87, in fact. At Turn 5, Kyffin Simpson was nudged by the Juncos Hollinger car of Agustin Canapino and it was enough to deflate the Ganassi car’s left-rear tire and send him into a spin. Broadside across the track, he was struck hard by Graham Rahal, who had earlier dodged a bullet by swerving around Armstrong’s spinning car, but this time was eliminated on the spot.

The caution, and the reduced number of green-flag laps alleviated Herta’s fuel worries. The race restarted with four laps to go, and while fairly subdued, Palou easily pulled clear of Herta, who in turn dropped Rossi. Grosjean came under pressure from Newgarden, while Kirkwood and Dixon followed. Power passed O’Ward on lap 93, and then locked sights on Dixon. However, on the penultimate lap, he was gifted another spot when Newgarden again ran wide at Turn 6, and half-spun, dropping to 19th.

Palou ran out the win by 2s over Herta, with Rossi, Grosjean and Kirkwood completing the top five. Dixon held off Power, O’Ward and Ferrucci, while Ericsson claimed 10th despite two major offs.

RESULTS