It's all Alex Palou in dominant IndyCar Laguna Seca race win

There was never any doubt.

On a weekend where Pato O'Ward hoped to apply pressure and gain championship ground, frontrunner Alex Palou snatched the pole and marched off to a comfortable win to draw close to his fourth NTT IndyCar Series title.

Alex Palou, Chip Ganassi Racing

Photo by: Jake Galstad / Lumen via Getty Images

Palou was the class of the field Sunday, leading 84 of 95 laps. California’s own Nolan Siegel held the top spot for 11 laps on an alternate strategy early on, but Palou surged past him on lap 37 and never looked back, becoming the first IndyCar competitor with an eight-win season since 2007.

With the win and O’Ward finishing fourth, Palou extended his championship advantage to 121 points with just three races remaining.

“What an amazing job by everybody at CGR, Honda, DHL, for giving us everything we needed to be as fast as we were,” Palou said. “It’s been an awesome weekend, awesome year overall. But today was something else.

“Super fun to be here. (It’s) one of my favorite tracks, for sure. I couldn’t be happier right now.”
Christian Lundgaard followed in second, pitting earlier than his rivals and using the undercut to rise up from seventh over the first three stints. The Dane had pace, but couldn’t take advantage of two late cautions to make moves on Palou, taking the checkered flag 3.7965 seconds behind his No. 10 Honda.

Colton Herta, Andretti Global

Photo by: Penske Entertainment

Colton Herta wrapped up the podium in third, with O’Ward fourth and Scott Dixon parlaying another off-sequence, fuel-saving strategy to fifth from 19th. Callum Ilott, Will Power, Marcus Armstrong, Christian Rasmussen and Scott McLaughlin wrapped up the top 10.

Sunday’s race brought early drama, with one caution-free incident on lap 1 and another that did bring out the yellow when Kyffin Simpson and Felix Rosenqvist crashed into the tire barrier at the end of turn 6.

Another caution flew just 10 laps later when Jacob Abel crashed alone with brake issues in turn 2.

That set the stage for an attrition-filled race, but it didn’t ultimately come to fruition. A caution flew when Rinus VeeKay was trapped in the turn 3 runoff after a misjudged lunge from Kyle Kirkwood, but the race proceeded to go green through the rest of the pit sequence. Two late cautions added late intrigue, but there were minimal shifts over the final laps. Only Marcus Ericsson, Abel and Simpson failed to reach the checkered flag.

The IndyCar field will return to action for the BitNile.com Grand Prix of Portland on Aug. 10. It will be the final road course race of the 2025 season.

Photos from Laguna Seca - Race

1 - 2
Cla	Driver	#	Laps	Time	Interval	Mph	Pits	Points	Retirement
1	A. Palou Chip Ganassi Racing	10	95	2:05'00.1159		110.742	3
2	C. Lundgaard Arrow McLaren	7	95	+3.7965 2:05'03.9124	3.7965	110.965	3
3	C. Herta Andretti Global	26	95	+4.6340 2:05'04.7499	0.8375	110.497	3
4	P. O'Ward Arrow McLaren	5	95	+6.6484 2:05'06.7643	2.0144	110.401	3
5	S. Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing	9	95	+7.3422 2:05'07.4581	0.6938	110.600	3
6	C. Ilott Prema Racing	90	95	+8.9243 2:05'09.0402	1.5821	110.349	3
7	W. Power Team Penske	12	95	+11.5298 2:05'11.6457	2.6055	109.625	3
8	M. Armstrong Meyer Shank Racing	66	95	+13.0055 2:05'13.1214	1.4757	109.148	3
9	C. Rasmussen Ed Carpenter Racing	21	95	+14.0988 2:05'14.2147	1.0933	109.621	3
10	S. McLaughlin Team Penske	3	95	+14.5960 2:05'14.7119	0.4972	109.741	3
11	J. Newgarden Team Penske	2	95	+15.2224 2:05'15.3383	0.6264	109.665	3
12	G. Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	15	95	+16.5256 2:05'16.6415	1.3032	109.605	3
13	D. Malukas A.J. Foyt Enterprises	4	95	+16.9614 2:05'17.0773	0.4358	109.440	4
14	C. Daly Juncos Hollinger Racing	76	95	+17.8336 2:05'17.9495	0.8722	109.695	5
15	A. Rossi Ed Carpenter Racing	20	95	+19.1194 2:05'19.2353	1.2858	109.329	4
16	K. Kirkwood Andretti Global	27	95	+19.7294 2:05'19.8453	0.6100	109.088	5
17	L. Foster Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	45	95	+21.5898 2:05'21.7057	1.8604	109.501	3
18	N. Siegel Arrow McLaren	6	95	+29.3009 2:05'29.4168	7.7111	107.025	4
19	R. Robb Sting Juncos Hollinger Racing	77	95	+30.4964 2:05'30.6123	1.1955	107.981	5
20	D. DeFrancesco Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	30	94	+1 Lap 2:05'23.4818	1 Lap	109.596	5
21	R. Shwartzman Prema Racing	83	94	+1 Lap 2:05'30.0400	6.5582	107.817	5
22	S. Ferrucci A.J. Foyt Enterprises	14	94	+1 Lap 2:05'55.2857	25.2457	103.454	4
23	R. van Kalmthout Dale Coyne Racing	18	92	+3 Laps 2:05'29.3868	2 Laps	107.420	4
24	F. Rosenqvist Meyer Shank Racing	60	91	+4 Laps 2:05'22.4178	1 Lap	109.109	6
25	M. Ericsson Andretti Global	28	78	+17 Laps 1:51'19.3242	13 Laps	16.758	4		Mechanical
26	J. Abel Dale Coyne Racing	51	10	+85 Laps 15'16.1797	68 Laps	109.868			Accident
27	K. Simpson Chip Ganassi Racing	8	0	+95 Laps 1.4372	10 Laps	74.357			Accident
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