Palou Cruises To Another IndyCar Victory In Portland

Alex Palou in victory lane at Portland Int'l Raceway. (Chris Owens/Penske Entertainment photo)

By Thomas Hughes, SWN Staff Writer

PORTLAND, Oregon (Aug. 9, 2026) — Alex Palou is running out of ways to make his championship lead look any more comfortable.

The Chip Ganassi Racing driver delivered another composed performance Sunday at Portland Int’l Raceway, navigating a race spearheaded by tire strategy to win the OnlyBulls Grand Prix of Portland and further distance himself from the rest of the NTT IndyCar Series field.

Palou's No. 10 DHL Honda crossed the finish line 4.1167 seconds ahead of Meyer Shank Racing’s Felix Rosenqvist, giving Palou his sixth win of the season and the 25th of his career. More importantly, it expanded his championship advantage to 110 points over Kyle Kirkwood with only five races left.

“It’s incredible,” Palou said. “I feel like you don’t really realize when you’re just going week in and week out. But when you look back and see those numbers, they’re incredible. But I could not do it without the team, with everybody that is around me giving me the chance every single weekend. The preparation we have before every weekend, having had the opportunity to test here a couple weeks ago, just having always the best strategies; it’s incredible.

“But at the end of the day, we need to keep it up.”

Portland was not a race Palou won by simply driving away from the field. Instead, it was a race in which he repeatedly made the right decision at the right time, particularly when it came to managing Firestone’s two differing tire compounds. But Rosenqvist had the early advantage.

Starting from the pole, the Meyer Shank Racing driver led the opening 30 laps as Palou and Andretti Global’s Will Power settled into second and third. All three started on the primary tire, creating an early race in which track position mattered more than outright pace.

That changed when the first round of pit stops arrived. 

Rosenqvist and Power came in at the end of Lap 31. Palou stayed out for one additional lap, using the extra time on track to put together a fast-enough lap that the overcut ultimately vaulted him ahead of both drivers after the stops cycled through.

Then, once he reclaimed the lead on lap 37, Palou was rarely threatened for long. Despite differing pit strategies shuffling the running order throughout the race, the No. 10 consistently returned to the front.

Even when it appeared that Rosenqvist found an advantage late in the race, Palou had an answer. Rosenqvist's final stint on the alternate tire gave him considerably more grip, allowing him to close the gap to Palou to less than a second by lap 80.

For a brief stretch, it looked like the race could come down to a battle between the two drivers in the closing laps. Then, traffic intervened.

Rosenqvist became trapped behind Louis Foster, giving Palou the breathing room he needed. One lap later, the gap had grown to 1.7 seconds.

Palou, who stretched the lead out to 1.7 seconds a lap after Rosenqvist was trapped, then made his final stop on lap 82, returning to the primary black tire for the closing stint.

That might have opened the door for a late challenge from Rosenqvist, but the gap was enough for Palou to manage the remainder of the race, rather than spend the final laps defending at earn turn. 

“[Palou] just drove better, to be honest,” Rosenqvist said. “Not a lot quicker, but he was a little bit quicker, especially on the blacks. … I don’t think I could have kept up with that pace he did anyways if I saved that much fuel.”

Meanwhile, Power, a two-time series champion who is in the midst of his first season with the Andretti Global team, had a potentially valuable set of alternate tires waiting for his final stop. A missed pit call kept him on track for an extra lap, however, and traffic from Scott Dixon and Sting Ray Robb cost him additional time.

Power eventually finished third, putting him on the podium at an event he had won each of the previous two years with Team Penske. Rinus VeeKay finished fourth, while Kirkwood completed the top five and helped Andretti Global place two cars inside the top five.

VeeKay’s fourth-place effort was his third top five in the past five races, continuing a strong stretch that has vaulted him to 10th place in the drivers’ standings.

But the race belonged to Palou.

“It’s tough, man,” Power said of the Spaniard. “He makes no mistakes. He’s very quick. I feel like we’ve closed the gap. We’re there. Just takes time.”

Palou led 60 of the 110 laps, and the only caution period lasted just two laps, meaning the outcome was largely determined by the drivers’ ability to manage their tires and execute their strategies over long green-flag stretches. Palou did both better than anyone else.

With six wins already in the season, Palou now has a 110-point cushion over Kirkwood with five races remaining as he pursues his fifth career championship and a fourth consecutive series title.

“More comfortable than when we came here,” Palou said. “This was one of those weekends where we wanted to do good. … There’s still a lot of points to play. It was important to maximize.”

Team Penske’s David Malukas sits in third with 392 points, 110 back of Palou and 118 back of Kirkwood; Arrow McLaren teammates Christian Lundgaard and Pato O’Ward round out the top five in points with 375 and 355 points, respectively.

There are still 275 points available over the remainder of the season, but after another race in which Palou combined speed with patience and turned a one-lap strategic gamble into a decisive advantage, the championship feels near-impossible to not end up in his hands.

The series next heads to Canada for the inaugural Ontario Honda Dealers Indy on the streets of Markham, Ontario, from Aug. 14-16. Qualifying is set for Saturday, Aug. 15 at 2:25 p.m. ET, while the race is set for the following day at 12 p.m. ET.

The battle to set the order can be viewed on TV on FS1, while the race airs live on FOX, the IndyCar Radio Network, and SiriusXM IndyCar Nation, channel 218.