IndyCar
Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou leads INDYCAR Championship heading into month of May at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway
BIRMINGHAM, AL (Pittsburgh Racing Now) – Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou is leading the NTT INDYCAR SERIES Championship points as the series heads to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the Month of May activities including the GMR Grand Prix on May 14 and the 106th Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge.
Palou took the Championship points lead after a second place finish at this past Sunday’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES Honda Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park and a third place finish at the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach on April 10.
Palou started third at Barber and lost to a spot at the drop of the green flag and spent much of the first stint keeping pace with leaders Rinus VeeKay, Pato O’Ward and McLaughlin.
“I did a couple of mistakes, lost a position on the start with the No. 3 position in the restart with 27,” said Palou. “That just cost me a lot of track time, a lot of track position let’s say.”
Palou ran in the Top 5 all day and was able to get around McLaughlin with the help of his No. 10 American Legion Honda pit crew, who leap frogged McLaughlin, on the final round of pit stops when Palou was able to stay out a lap longer than his other competitors.
“We made a risky strategy of staying out a lot more than others, saving fuel,” said Palou, who won last year’s race at Barber in his debut with CGR.
Palou was trailing VeeKay and O’Ward following the last round of pit stops and set his sights on second place, which was now occupied by VeeKay who passed on the outside by O’Ward in Turn 5. Palou knew he had to go.
“I went two laps longer so I knew I could push more,” explained Palou. “I didn’t really had to save that much fuel as him. I said, Okay, we’ll have a chance, have plenty of overtake to use. I felt really comfortable with the car. Started pushing.”
Palou passed VeeKay on Lap 63 and started running down O’Ward in the closing laps.
“I pushed till the end,” said Palou. “Caught him on some laps, lost a little bit of time on some others. He was really good. It’s maybe a track where even if you’re a little bit faster, you cannot really pass. It’s so hard. As soon as I would get, I don’t know, a second close to him, I would just lose my front and drop 3/10ths max. I was trying to push him and try and make him to do a mistake or try to make him to push too much, have to save fuel. But, no, he did a good job.”
Palou, the defending Series Champion, now sets his sights on The GMR Grand Prix and ‘The Greatest Spectacle In Racing’.
“I cannot wait,” said Palou. “It’s such a special place. It’s good that we got a good race now, I don’t know, to get a bit more relaxed going into Indy road course where we had strong results there and we were competitive. Cannot wait for the 106th Indianapolis 500.”
LONG BEACH, CA (April 21, 2024) Scott Dixon put on a Masterclass in winning Sunday’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.
Dixon started eighth in the No. 9 PNC Bank Honda and used a combination of strategy and race craft to get the lead and hold off hard chargers Josef Newgarden, Colton Herta and reigning and two-time series Champion Alex Palou.
“That was fun,” said a smiling Dixon about his second Long Beach win. “I think it was definitely a bit sketchy in the fact that the pressure is coming hard and strong. Huge credit to the team. A big weekend for Honda, Acura, HRC. I think we had almost 200 PNC guests this weekend here.”
Dixon and race leader Will Power pitted during a caution period triggered when Ed Carpenter Racing rookie Christian Rasmussen hit the wall on Lap 15. That handed the race lead to series points leader Josef Newgarden who was followed by Marcus Ericsson, Herta, and Palou as the different strategies began to play out.
Newgarden and the drivers who elected to stay out started to hit the pits on lap 30 with Herta stretching it to lap 33. Meanwhile Dixon, Power and those who pitted earlier cycled to the front of the field before making their second and final pit stops on laps 52-53, handing the lead back to Newgarden, Herta and Palou.
The differing strategies converged after Newgarden and the rest pitted for the final time between laps 58-62. Newgarden came out of the pits in second, trailing Dixon by about three seconds with seven-lap fresher tires.
Newgarden was able to cut into Dixon’s lead but the six-time series Champion used an expert combination of push-to-pass and fuel saving to stay out front.
“I knew it was going to be tough,” said Dixon. “I think what you kind of hope for in the long run is that you get some caution laps again, which would have made it a lot easier for us. Again, the pace was pretty solid, man. We didn’t really have to push crazy amounts. It saved the tires as well. The car had plenty of pace left at the end.”
Newgarden got to Dixon’s gearbox in the hairpin turn that leads onto the frontstretch on Lap 77 but Herta made contact with the No. 2 Chevy, lifting the rear wheels off the ground sending the car into anti-stall mode.
“It seemed pretty obvious,” said Newgarden, who lost two-spots in the process. “He just misjudged it and ran into me. I’m not saying we were going to get Dixon. It was very, very difficult for me to get the run I needed to. I think traffic was going to provide me an opportunity, so that run right there, I was really excited about it.”
“I think he (Newgarden) set up pretty wide and was cutting back in and was a little slower at apex, but ultimately it’s up to me to carry the right speed into the corner and not run into the back of people, and I just misjudged it,” explained Herta.
Dixon took advantage of the extra breathing room to lock down his 57th career win, which is ten shy of A.J. Foyt’s series leading 67-victories.
“It’s one of those things that I always say hopefully when you leave the sport, you’re happy with the stats,” said Dixon. “Of course, these are big stats. This is a big deal. We’re still a long way away from that.”
The victory was Dixon’s fourth in the last six points-paying INDYCAR Series races dating back to last year.
“It’s great to win early in the season,” said Dixon. “It’s huge. It’s big for the team, big for everybody’s morale. Hopefully that stuff carries to the marquee event coming up here shortly in the 500. But right now the focus is Barber next week.”
The Children’s of Alabama Indy Grand Prix powered by AmFirst on Sunday, April 28 at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Alabama. Live coverage starts at 1 p.m. ET on NBC, Peacock, INDYCAR LIVE and the INDYCAR Radio Network.
LONG BEACH, CA (April 20, 2024) Meyer Shank Racing’s Felix Rosenqvist is on the pole position for Sunday’s NTT INDYCAR SERIES Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.
Rosenqvist’s fast lap of 1:06.1672 (107.317 mph) around the 11-turn, 1.968-mile temporary street course in the No. 60 AutoNation/SiriusXM Honda was .0039 of a second quicker than Team Penske’s Will Power in the No. 12 Verizon Chevrolet.
“Honestly, I didn’t think I had it because I had a big tank-slapper out of (Turn) 5,” said Rosenqvist. “This is a hard-fought one. It doesn’t come easy. Every lap out there, you’re flirting with the walls. That was a fun one.”
“Obviously, it’s a bit (tough) when you miss out by that much, but Felix must have done a phenomenal lap,” said Power. “I couldn’t pick anywhere where I made a mistake. It was about as good as I can do.”
This is the third front-row start for Rosenqvist in 2024, who started second at the season-opening Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg presented by RP Funding and started first in the non-points-paying $1-million-dollar Thermal Club Challenge last month.
Power’s teammate and series points-leader Josef Newgarden will start third in the No. 2 Hitachi Chevrolet after a quick lap of 1:06.1059 (107.173). Joining Newgarden on the second row is California native Colton Herta, who qualified fourth at 1:06.3784 (106.734) in the No. 26 Gainbridge Honda of Andretti Global.
Herta’s Andretti Global teammate Marcus Ericsson qualified fifth at 1:06.4039 in the No. 28 Delaware Life Honda. Reigning and two-time series champion Alex Palou will start sixth at 1:06.5444 in the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda.
Palou’s CGR teammates Scott Dixon will start eighth in the No. 9 PNC Bank Honda after being eliminated in the second round of knockout-style qualifying. Marcus Armstrong will start ninth in the No. 10 Ridgeline Lubricants Honda. Rookies Linus Lundqvist and Kyffin Simpson will start 17th and 26th respectively.
It was a mystifying qualifying session for the Arrow McClaren Chevrolets, who were in both practice sessions leading up to qualifying. Alexander Ross was eliminated in the first round of qualifying and will start 13th on the grid in the No. 7 Chevrolet and Pato O’Ward, who led Friday practice, will start 14th in the No. 5 Chevrolet. Newcomer Theo Pourchaire will start 22nd in the No. 6 Chevrolet.
THERMAL, CA (March 24, 2024) – Alex Palou and his No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing team led every lap en route to victory in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES Sprint for the Purse exhibition at The Thermal Club, claiming a cool $500,000 payday.
“Amazing to get the win, to get the money, just that feeling of winning again,” said Palou. “It’s what we needed.”
“Today was like a little Sunday drive out there in front all by himself,” said team owner Chip Ganassi. “He didn’t even break a sweat.”
Palou started on the pole position in the No. 10 Ridgeline Lubricants/DHL Honda and watched in his mirrors as his competitors elected to conserve tire wear on the dusty, sandy track in the hopes of challenging the reigning Series Champion in the second of two 10-lap segments.
“It’s always tough to try and manage the tires. ‘Am I doing too much? Am I not doing enough?’,” questioned Palou. “Honestly, once you saw during the main race, especially McLaughlin and Felix, were saving tires, I was like, Okay, that’s the best thing that they could have done for us.”
Palou cruised to a 5.7929-second victory over the No. 3 XPEL Team Penske Chevrolet of Scott McLaughlin, who earned $350,000 for his runner-up finish.
“The first 10 laps was about trying to get some position, which I did, to get to the second, maybe set myself up for a pass after the restart,” said McLaughlin. “Alex is a pretty smart driver, as we know. I knew he’d be doing exactly what I was doing. Ultimately I didn’t have enough pace for Alex either.
It is what it is. We’ll keep working. Alex has been fast all week and they deserve the win.”
Felix Rosenqvist finished third in just his second event with Meyer Shank Racing, taking home $250,000 for his efforts.
“I’m super happy we were able to have this week because it’s kind of been a mix of a race and a test for us, just trying different things, getting to know each other more,” explained Rosenqvist. “We’ve been quick, but I feel like every time we’re out there, we’re just learning something new. This has been a huge learning experience. Also some cash at the end of the day. Super proud of Meyer Shank Racing.”
Andretti Global’s Colton Herta took the tire saving to the extreme immediately taking it easy in the first 10-lap segment, where he finished 12-seconds behind Palou, but it paid off in the second segment as the No. 26 Gainbridge Honda restarted 9th and raced up to fourth.
“I think our strategy worked,” said Herta. “We were talking about it on pure pace, maybe we can move up six spots at most. If we get a little lucky and cars have some problems, but if we save the tires, we might get a little more. Obviously, the tire advantage was pretty big, so we were able to pick off everybody on the way up there.”
Palou’s teammates Marcus Armstrong finished fifth to pick up $50,000 for he and the No. 11 Ridgeline CGR Honda team and Linus Lundqvist finished sixth in the No. 8 American Legion Honda.
Missing from the CGR was Scott Dixon and the No. 9 PNC Bank Honda squad, who failed to transfer from the first heat race. Dixon made contact with Juncos Hollinger Racing’s Romain Grosjean on the opening lap and was penalized for avoidable contact. Dixon later apologized for the contact which caught him off-guard when Grosjean slowed earlier than expected.
The next points-paying NTT INDYCAR SERIES race is the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach on Sunday, April 21 on the streets of Long Beach, California.
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