Paddock Buzz: Graham Rahal Proud To Push Alex Palou to Limit
INDYCAR
Graham Rahal believes he did everything right in Saturday's Sonsio Grand Prix.
Leading a race-high 49 of 85 laps and controlling much of the early race, he clearly had pace and executed early well early. However, Alex Palou had superior long-run speed, and strategy allowed him to close the gap and make a decisive pass for the lead on Lap 58.
From there, Palou's consistency and race management in the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda sealed his third straight victory in the 85-lap race, continuing a dominant start to the season.
Rahal dropped to sixth in the end for his 15th top-10 finish in the last 16 starts on the 2.439-mile, 14-turn Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
'Those cars (Chip Ganassi Racing) are in a league of their own,' Rahal said. 'The grip that they have, the ability to follow so close compared to everybody else, I just don't know. I am genuinely proud. I don't think I locked up once. I don't think I put a wheel wrong. I defended as best I could. They're in a different stratosphere of grip. We tried our best. The Honda was quick today.
'I tried to just drive as flawlessly as I could because I knew that was the only way to beat him.'
Rahal not only executed well on track, but he did his homework by studying how to beat Palou at the start – and it worked.
He started alongside Palou, who, for the second consecutive year, won the NTT P1 Award for the Sonsio Grand Prix. Last year's race saw Rahal's then-Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing teammate Christian Lundgaard start alongside.
'I forced the issue with him,' Rahal said. 'I watched the video of him with Christian last year, and he purposely pushed Christian wide out of (Turn) 1. So, I wanted to do enough and get far enough by him that he couldn't do that. I worked hard to keep him behind me.'
A slow final pit stop on Lap 62 cost Rahal four spots, dropping from second to fifth. He then later was passed by the No. 9 PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing driven by Scott Dixon.
'I literally had a nightmare about stalling,' Rahal said. 'I knew it was going to be a really hard day to get it out of the pits, and unfortunately it was. We didn't stall but just couldn't get the tire to spin at all. So definitely something we've got to look at for next year.'
Kirkwood Returns to Second in Points
Kyle Kirkwood drove from 21st to eighth in the No. 27 PreFab Honda for Andretti Global, displaying determination and racecraft. That result helped him regain second in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES standings, a sizable 97 points behind Palou.
If Andretti Global can sharpen its setups and qualifying pace, Kirkwood could close the gap, though it will take more than top-10 finishes to reel in Palou's near-perfect form with four wins in the first five races.
'It's almost disappointing to be second and this far behind,' Kirkwood said. 'Good day today from the weekend we had. We didn't get warmup, so we were trying to win the race blind, especially with tire strategy. We just didn't really know, but we played our cards right. We had a really good race, and I think we got mostly everything out of it.'
The silver lining is Kirkwood didn't expect to be strong at The Thermal Club, Barber Motorsports Park or here. He finished eighth, 11th and eighth, respectively.
Up next are the 109th Running of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge, the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix presented by Lear (June 1) and the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 presented by Axalta and Valvoline at World Wide Technology Raceway (June 15), all tracks Kirkwood likes. He thinks he can at least hang on to second in the standings.
'We got a lot of good races coming up for us,' Kirkwood said. 'If I'm being honest, we knew Thermal, Barber and here were maybe our least competitive tracks. So, we got out of these with I think some really good finishes, and we'll move into the rest of the Month of May, a lot of street courses that we know we're good at and some short oval that we were turning into dominant race cars last year. So, those are the ones that will start to claw back at them.'
Newgarden Shifts Aim to '500'
Two-time series champion Josef Newgarden gave up his sixth starting spot in the race when he drove down pit lane before the race went green. Newgarden was dealing with a mechanical problem in his No. 2 Astemo Team Penske Chevrolet that the team diagnosed and fixed, allowing him to rejoin the field but at the back.
Newgarden rallied to finish 12th, salvaging what could have been another disappointing finish in a season of what might have been.
'I don't even know what to say about the day,' Newgarden said. 'It's just pretty disappointing. To have a MGU issue creep in during the beginning, we thought it was terminal and then sort of fixed itself. Starting last wasn't ideal. When you pretty much go green almost to the finish, it's hard to do much in this field, so we climbed as far as we could.'
Newgarden now is shifting his focus to trying to become the first driver to win the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge three consecutive years.
Shwartzman Rallies to 18th
Robert Shwartzman's performance Saturday is impressive, especially given the circumstances. With only six laps of track time before the race due to technical problems, starting last in a 27-car field could have easily spelled a frustrating day. Instead, he managed to climb nine positions and match his career-best finish of 18th – despite minimal preparation and an issue in the morning warmup.
'Really mixed feelings,' Shwartzman said.
That kind of resilience and adaptability, particularly on a technical track like the IMS road course, speaks to his raw talent and learning curve. For a rookie, navigating track and strategy with almost no data or experience is no small feat.
Shwartzman's finish is more than just a number – it's a gritty hard-earned result. Managing overheating by weaving into clean air, all while trying to make passes is a tough balancing act. Add in the wrong gear ratios limiting top-end speed, and his No. 83 PREMA Racing Chevrolet wasn't optimized for overtaking.
The fact he still made up nine spots, protected the car and brought it home cleanly speaks volumes about his composure.
'I can say pace-wise, we can be in the top 10,' Shwartzman said. 'We just need to execute it to show it.'
Shwartzman studied many videos Friday night to learn braking points, shifting points and how to at least get his eyes used to what to expect. To overcome this much adversity, he's satisfied.
Odds and Ends The eventual season champion has finished on the podium in the last five Sonsio Grand Prix races. Palou, Pato O'Ward and Will Power finished on the podium Saturday. Palou and Power have combined to win the last four championships. O'Ward has finished runner-up four times now at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, twice in the '500' (2022, 2024) and twice in the Sonsio Grand Prix (2023, 2025). He also finished runner-up at The Thermal Club INDYCAR Grand Prix this season and is fourth in points, trailing Palou by 100. Power earned his 139th career top-five finish in the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, tying Michael Andretti for seventh all-time. Al Unser, with 140, is next on the list. Dixon made his 407th career start Saturday, tying Mario Andretti for most ever. Rinus VeeKay was the Hard Charger of the race, climbing 15 positions in the No. 18 askROI Honda for Dale Coyne Racing. VeeKay has three top-10 finishes in five races this season and is 10th in points, 148 behind Palou.
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'I knew (using alternates on the second stint) was going to help us there, but it was going to hurt us a lot on the last stint, but honestly, the pace we had today in the No. 10 car was amazing, and we were able to save fuel even on primaries to be quite fast.' In a race with so many strategies at play, and seemingly even more splintering off every pit exchange, Palou was forced to manage chunks of laps where he'd be battling at the front, followed by stops that left him buried in 13th or 14th behind cars that, according to how the race would finish up, weren't really his true competition. But by Lap 22, as the yellow flags flew for Conor Daly's off-track excursion, Palou could've inherited the lead had Wanser opted for him to stay out, rather than pit at a time where the team wasn't sorely in need for fuel. With it being the race's fourth caution, Palou's second stint only ran 12 laps, several of them under caution, and Palou said he still could've run five laps more before diving in, similar to what Felix Rosenqvist (runner-up) and Kyle Kirkwood (fourth) opted to do. But pitting there ultimately gave him track position at the end of the race, a roll of the dice that he felt made the difference in the win that fell into his lap with Scott Dixon forced to pit late and Rosenqvist still a couple seconds back by the checkered flag. 'That was the moment that I would say gave us the win,' Palou said of Wanser's call on when to make his second of three stops. But Wanser and Palou didn't feel comfortable until a ways later. Though they knew Dixon had pitted two laps before them on his second stop, the No. 10 stand continued to watch late in the race as the six-time champ rolled off competitive lap times again and again. By their math, Palou was going to be cutting it close on fuel as is, ultimately enough post-race to run a cooldown lap, but not fire off any celebratory donuts. So how was Dixon holding onto his gap on his teammate, they kept wondering? 'I even said to all the engineers on the stand, 'Are we missing something here? Because Dixon is running (fuel) numbers and lap times that (Palou's) not going to be able to get, based on the number we gave him,'' Wanser said. 'They double checked everything, triple checked, but we were pretty confident we were going to be fine.' Had Dixon lucked into a late-race yellow, Palou said he wasn't sure he had enough speed in the car to swoop around the outside for what would've needed to be a pass for the win on his teammate. 'When I was following Scott, I could see that he wasn't saving as much as I was. I was like, 'This guy is crazy. How is he going to do it?'' Palou said. 'If it was another driver, I would have probably just focused on myself, but I know that Scott can make crazy stuff happen. 'If he gets a yellow and he's still P1, we're not going to be able to pass him. We were still trying to get that first-place position on track, just in case there was a four-lap yellow at the end, and he would've still been leading and maybe ended up with a win.' In all, the chaos kept things interesting, and Palou's Sunday kept him longing for something else the next time out, too. 'We couldn't do donuts,' he joked. 'I would've liked that, but at least (we had) enough to make it to Victory Lane.'
