until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League

IndyCar

Palou wins on Indy road course ahead of 2-3-5 for McLaren

by Jack Benyon
13 min read

until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League

Alex Palou took his fifth IndyCar win with a strong strategic drive to claim the championship lead heading into the Indianapolis 500, with Pato O’Ward jumping to second in the championship with a runner-up finish on the Indy road course.

Chip Ganassi Racing’s Palou quickly made his way forward from third – amid a scrappy start for a Turn 1 shunt and another at Turn 7 that brought out a caution – on the softer tyre and passed first-time pole sitter Christian Lundgaard at Turn 12 on the first lap.

The pair split their tyre strategies in the second stint, with Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s Lundgaard taking the faster softs and scything past Palou five laps after his stop. But, unlike during the first stint, Palou barged back past before Lundgaard could pit at the end of the stint.

That meant – apart from a brief undercut from Arrow McLaren’s O’Ward jumping the pair – that Palou also undercut into the lead on the harder tyre, with Lundgaard having to make a used set of softs run until 25 laps from the end.

That gave Palou freedom to build a 6.4-second lead by the time O’Ward passed Lundgaard for second.

O’Ward’s race was made in the second stint when he passed team-mate Alexander Rossi and destroyed a decent gap to another stablemate Felix Rosenqvist to run third into the final stop, despite visible lines on his tyres from wear.

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A pass on Lundgaard in the penultimate stint put him six seconds behind Palou with four laps more on his tyres and, on lap 59 of 85, Lundgaard triggered the final stops as the others then looked to cover him.

Palou pitted a lap later to avoid a caution costing him the win. O’Ward looked to stay out gambling on a caution not coming out as a longer stint would give him a short run on fresh soft tyres to end the race, but two cars stalling on pitlane caused sufficient panic that O’Ward pitted earlier than desired with 23 laps to do on the fragile softs.

The length of that stint for O’Ward meant he had to save and Palou’s 10-second advantage was more than enough to see him through to victory in a very quiet last stint, where he managed the gap and brought the car home for a win that gives him momentum heading into May’s Indy 500 festivities.

O’Ward brought the car home for his third second-place finish of the season with team-mate Rossi emerging as the podium threat, passing Lundgaard with 10 laps to go, with the benefit of soft tyres and stopping six laps later.

Alexander Rossi Gmr Grand Prix Friday May 12 2023 By Karl Zemlin Largeimagewithoutwatermark M79028

It marks Rossi’s first podium for Arrow McLaren since his move from Andretti, delivering consistency but a lack of headline results so far, with a Texas pitlane crash and suspension issue at Long Beach not helping his championship position.

Lundgaard benefitted from a battle behind him between second-place starter Rosenqvist and the only driver in the mix on fading soft tyres, Colton Herta, to take his second IndyCar podium on a strong weekend for a Rahal team that had previously struggled before Lundgaard’s sixth at Barber.

Herta was given a blocking penalty with seven laps to go and had to give the position to Rosenqvist.

That gave Rosenqvist fifth – his best result of the year – as Scott Dixon and Josef Newgarden also passed Herta in quick succession.

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Dixon qualified ninth – continuing his improved qualifying form in 2023 at a track that he’s struggled at before – but was caught up in the lap-one incident where Kyle Kirkwood spun Graham Rahal at Turn 1.

He sunk outside the top 15, but continuously executed an undercut strategy and made the most of two sets of primary tyres to keep moving forward. His pace was really the only thing that made the comeback possible.

Newgarden started 13th because of a spin in front of him in qualifying meant he had to bail out of his last fast lap, so seventh was a strong drive forwards – especially as he had a slow final stop, without which he though he should have been third over the line.

Marcus Ericsson Gmr Grand Prix Friday May 12 2023 By Joe Skibinski Largeimagewithoutwatermark M78937

Marcus Ericsson lost the championship lead and dropped to third overall but scored eighth ahead of Herta, with Rahal – who had to pit after being hit by Kirkwood on lap one – driving long stints afterwards and turning his woe into a brilliant top-10 finish.

Romain Grosjean made an error at Turn 7 on the first lap having started 18th, but drove up to 11th on a three-stop strategy (with an additional stop for a front-wing change) ahead of Penske pair Will Power and Scott McLaughlin.

Marcus Armstrong was the top rookie in 16th place.

Race Results

Pos Name Team Car Laps Laps Led Total Time Fastest Lap Pitstops Pts
1 Alex Palou Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 85 52 1h47m56.7s 1m11.291s 3 53
2 Patricio O'Ward Arrow McLaren SP Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 2 +16.801s 1m12.031s 3 41
3 Alexander Rossi Arrow McLaren SP Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 3 +18.145s 1m11.73s 3 36
4 Christian Lundgaard Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 85 13 +23.48s 1m11.786s 3 34
5 Felix Rosenqvist Arrow McLaren SP Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 3 +23.926s 1m11.953s 3 31
6 Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 85 3 +25.521s 1m11.808s 3 29
7 Josef Newgarden Team Penske Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 0 +26.316s 1m12.335s 3 26
8 Marcus Ericsson Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 85 2 +31.831s 1m12.185s 3 25
9 Colton Herta Andretti Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 85 0 +38.419s 1m12.267s 3 22
10 Graham Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 85 7 +48.872s 1m12.822s 4 21
11 Romain Grosjean Andretti Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 85 0 +52.574s 1m12.726s 4 19
12 Will Power Team Penske Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 0 +59.77s 1m12.38s 3 18
13 Rinus VeeKay Ed Carpenter Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 0 +1m07.071s 1m11.924s 3 17
14 Kyle Kirkwood Andretti Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 85 0 +1m08.194s 1m12.128s 3 16
15 Marcus Armstrong Chip Ganassi Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 85 0 +1m15.85s 1m12.184s 3 15
16 Scott McLaughlin Team Penske Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 85 0 +1m23.639s 1m12.691s 5 14
17 Devlin DeFrancesco Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport Dallara DW12-Honda 84 0 +1 lap 1m12.489s 3 13
18 Callum Ilott Juncos Hollinger Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 84 0 +1 lap 1m12.419s 4 12
19 Conor Daly Ed Carpenter Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 84 0 +1 lap 1m13.136s 3 11
20 Jack Harvey Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 84 0 +1 lap 1m12.012s 3 10
21 Agustín Canapino Juncos Hollinger Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 84 0 +1 lap 1m12.609s 3 9
22 Hélio Castroneves Meyer Shank Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 84 0 +1 lap 1m11.942s 3 8
23 Santino Ferrucci AJ Foyt Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 80 0 +5 laps 1m12.675s 3 7
24 Benjamin Pedersen AJ Foyt Racing Dallara DW12-Chevrolet 79 0 +6 laps 1m11.985s 3 6
Simon Pagenaud Meyer Shank Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 58 0 DNF 1m12.8s 3 5
David Malukas Dale Coyne Racing/HMD Motorsports Dallara DW12-Honda 2 0 DNF 1m18.172s 0 5
Sting Ray Robb Dale Coyne Racing Dallara DW12-Honda 1 0 DNF 1m19.027s 0 5

Driver Standings

Pos Driver Team Points R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 R6 R7 R8 R9 R10 R11 R12 R13 R14 R15 R16 R17
1 Alex Palou Chip Ganassi Racing 656 24 36 31 30 53 45 54 51 53 40 25 35 36 26 26 53 38
2 Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing 578 36 31 5 26 29 35 32 32 41 33 28 29 30 51 53 36 51
3 Scott McLaughlin Team Penske 488 20 28 20 51 14 16 26 24 30 29 40 31 42 24 31 22 40
4 Patricio O'Ward Arrow McLaren SP 484 41 41 13 32 41 17 6 35 24 24 35 20 24 35 41 32 23
5 Josef Newgarden Team Penske 479 13 53 23 16 26 51 21 40 18 30 53 53 32 5 6 30 9
6 Marcus Ericsson Chip Ganassi Racing 438 51 24 35 20 25 44 23 28 5 20 32 23 27 20 20 26 15
7 Will Power Team Penske 425 26 14 28 36 18 9 41 18 36 16 32 42 21 28 23 5 32
8 Christian Lundgaard Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 390 22 11 16 28 34 11 14 26 32 54 10 17 22 33 13 19 28
9 Alexander Rossi Arrow McLaren SP 375 32 8 8 24 36 37 31 20 20 14 20 15 11 30 33 10 26
10 Colton Herta Andretti Autosport 356 10 27 32 16 22 23 19 34 21 35 11 26 9 17 29 17 8
11 Kyle Kirkwood Andretti Autosport 352 15 5 54 18 16 5 29 22 13 15 26 19 53 22 15 20 5
12 Felix Rosenqvist Arrow McLaren SP 324 11 7 26 22 31 16 35 10 5 20 17 33 8 5 24 41 13
13 Romain Grosjean Andretti Autosport 296 14 17 40 44 19 5 6 5 17 8 19 18 29 12 18 5 20
14 Rinus VeeKay Ed Carpenter Racing 277 9 19 5 14 17 32 12 18 15 17 13 12 16 19 19 28 12
15 Graham Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 276 28 6 18 13 21 8 5 19 27 22 5 10 15 44 10 20 5
16 Callum Ilott Juncos Hollinger Racing 266 30 22 11 17 12 19 5 12 14 12 15 16 18 13 5 15 30
17 David Malukas Dale Coyne Racing/HMD Motorsports 265 21 32 10 11 5 5 7 5 28 10 18 24 5 14 35 25 10
18 Hélio Castroneves Meyer Shank Racing 217 7 20 9 9 8 16 11 15 9 9 16 14 19 15 7 16 17
19 Santino Ferrucci AJ Foyt Racing 214 6 9 19 10 7 45 9 14 6 13 5 8 12 7 17 14 13
20 Marcus Armstrong Chip Ganassi Racing 214 19 0 24 19 15 0 24 7 22 26 0 0 17 6 0 11 24
21 Agustín Canapino Juncos Hollinger Racing 180 18 18 6 5 9 5 16 11 7 18 14 5 10 9 8 5 16
22 Devlin DeFrancesco Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport 177 5 7 14 7 13 17 18 7 16 7 8 9 5 12 11 13 8
23 Sting Ray Robb Dale Coyne Racing 147 14 6 12 5 5 5 8 8 8 11 5 5 13 8 9 7 18
24 Jack Harvey Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 146 8 12 17 6 10 12 13 5 12 6 12 11 6 16 0 0 0
25 Conor Daly Meyer Shank Racing 134 16 10 7 5 11 24 15 0 10 0 9 13 0 0 14 0 0
26 Ryan Hunter-Reay Ed Carpenter Racing 131 0 0 0 0 0 20 0 13 11 5 7 6 14 10 16 9 20
27 Benjamin Pedersen AJ Foyt Racing 129 5 15 6 8 6 11 10 9 5 5 5 5 7 5 5 8 14
28 Simon Pagenaud Meyer Shank Racing 88 5 13 15 12 5 5 17 16 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
29 Takuma Sato Chip Ganassin Racing 70 0 5 0 0 0 32 0 0 0 0 23 5 0 0 5 0 0
30 Ed Carpenter Ed Carpenter Racing 46 0 17 0 0 0 10 0 0 0 0 6 7 0 0 6 0 0
31 Linus Lundqvist Meyer Shank Racing 35 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 18 12 0 0
32 Tony Kanaan Arrow McLaren SP 18 0 0 0 0 0 18 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
32 Jüri Vips Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 18 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 12 6
34 Tom Blomqvist Meyer Shank Racing 16 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 6 5
35 Marco Andretti Dreyer & Reinbold Racing 13 0 0 0 0 0 13 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
36 RC Enerson Abel Motorsports 5 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
36 Katherine Legge Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 5 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
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