IndyCar

Palou clinches 2023 IndyCar title with Portland win

by Jack Benyon
9 min read

Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou sealed a second IndyCar championship with a race to spare by winning at Portland.

The 26-year-old Spaniard had won his first title in his maiden season with the Ganassi team back in 2021, and his average finish of 3.75 this year with wins at the Indianapolis road course, Detroit, Road America, Mid-Ohio and now Portland establish him as IndyCar’s driver to beat.

It’s strange to think he could have been driving for McLaren this year – but a settlement out of court kept him at Ganassi for 2023 – and now a year later he’s being sued again, this time by McLaren over its claim Palou signed with it for next year.

Though Ganassi has yet to officially announce that Palou is staying put for 2024 after all, team owner Chip Ganassi replied with an emphatic “Palou’s going to be in our car next year, I can tell you that” when asked about that situation.

In the race, polesitter Graham Rahal had a strong start – before a lap four caution for a spinning Will Power – and he and Scott McLaughlin went for a shorter first stint on the softer tyre, while Palou – who passed a host of cars at the start including title rival and Ganassi team-mate Scott Dixon – started on the hards.

Palou did a longer first stint which involved a scintillating display of pace culminating in a host of fastest laps, and emerged over 10 seconds clear of Rahal with Dixon, Felix Rosenqvist and Pato O’Ward also jumping Rahal and McLaughlin by using the Palou strategy in the first stint.

Palou briefly extended the gap to Rahal to over 15 seconds, but could only do 16 laps on the softs before he had to pit, leaving Dixon and Rosenqvist out front but still to run the softs.

Palou still only needed one more stop to get to the end and emerged with a strong lead and with a full pitstop distance ahead of Rahal for good measure before a caution with 27-laps to go for a beached Agustin Canapino reset the field.

IndyCar kept the pitlane open to let Rosenqvist pit and avoid ruining any driver’s race as has been consistent with its approach in the last two seasons, but calling the yellow as Rosenqvist emerged from the pits robbed Dixon of the chance to catch and pass him on an out-lap, which Dixon expressed fury about in a swearing radio message.

On fresh soft tyres, Rosenqvist harried Palou on the restart but Palou kept him at arm’s length and used his longer-lasting hard tyres to edge clear by 5.43 seconds at the finish.

Rosenqvist took second for his best result of the year ahead of Dixon, whose title bid ended because Palou would have sealed the title regardless of his result.

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O’Ward took fourth for Arrow McLaren, ahead of Josef Newgarden in fifth as the top Penske.

Starting on the soft tyre was clearly not the correct strategy and Ed Carpenter’s Rinus VeeKay and Marcus Ericsson were the top drivers on that strategy in sixth and seventh, with VeeKay dumping Ericsson off the track earlier in the race without penalty.

Dale Coyne’s David Malukas pitted under the first caution and went from 23rd to eighth, ahead of McLaughlin and Kyle Kirkwood.

Rahal lost out in a melee on the final restart and ended up behind his team-mate Rahal Letterman Lanigan Christian Lundgaard, who started 17th, in 12th.

Ganassi’s Marcus Armstrong had driven a phenomenal race to run ahead of polesitter Rahal from 14th on the grid but he was released from his box with the right rear not secured and it fell off, beaching his car and costing a top 10 and possibly even a top five.

He should have asserted a strong rookie of the year lead with his result, and actually did extend the gap with 19th once Canapino spun later on.

Race Results

Pos Name Team Car Laps Laps Led Total Time Fastest Lap Pitstops Pts
1 Alex Palou Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 110 69 1h57m01.981s 59.53s 3 53
2 Felix Rosenqvist Arrow McLaren SP Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 3 +5.436s 59.944s 3 41
3 Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 110 15 +8.067s 59.737s 3 36
4 Patricio O'Ward Arrow McLaren SP Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 0 +19.058s 1m0.094s 3 32
5 Josef Newgarden Team Penske Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 0 +21.084s 59.382s 3 30
6 Rinus VeeKay Ed Carpenter Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 0 +21.88s 59.763s 3 28
7 Marcus Ericsson Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 110 0 +30.582s 1m0.02s 3 26
8 David Malukas Dale Coyne Racing/HMD Motorsports Dallara DW12-Honda 110 2 +32.622s 1m0.082s 4 25
9 Scott McLaughlin Team Penske Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 0 +33.029s 59.9s 3 22
10 Kyle Kirkwood Andretti Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 110 0 +33.784s 1m0.519s 3 20
11 Christian Lundgaard Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 110 0 +34.476s 59.942s 3 19
12 Graham Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 110 21 +38.7s 59.831s 3 20
13 Colton Herta Andretti Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 110 0 +39.759s 1m0.222s 4 17
14 Hélio Castroneves Meyer Shank Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 110 0 +40.338s 1m0.37s 3 16
15 Callum Ilott Juncos Hollinger Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 0 +40.477s 1m0.42s 3 15
16 Santino Ferrucci AJ Foyt Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 110 0 +41.128s 1m0.371s 3 14
17 Devlin DeFrancesco Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 110 0 +42.558s 1m0.203s 3 13
18 Jüri Vips Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 109 0 +1 lap 1m0.307s 3 12
19 Marcus Armstrong Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 109 0 +1 lap 1m0.233s 3 11
20 Alexander Rossi Arrow McLaren SP Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 109 0 +1 lap 1m0.201s 4 10
21 Ryan Hunter-Reay Ed Carpenter Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 109 0 +1 lap 1m0.501s 4 9
22 Benjamin Pedersen AJ Foyt Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 109 0 +1 lap 1m0.334s 3 8
23 Sting Ray Robb Dale Coyne Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 109 0 +1 lap 1m01.061s 3 7
24 Tom Blomqvist Meyer Shank Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 109 0 +1 lap 1m0.321s 4 6
25 Will Power Team Penske Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 108 0 +2 laps 1m0.679s 3 5
Agustín Canapino Juncos Hollinger Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 82 0 DNF 1m0.595s 3 5
Romain Grosjean Andretti Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 31 0 DNF 1m0.044s 2 5
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