Palou wins IndyCar season opener with strategy…

Alex Palou’s quest for a third-straight NTT IndyCar Series title is off to a perfect start.

The Spaniard surged to the lead with the correct tire strategy and kept Josef Newgarden at bay over the closing stretch to claim Sunday’s Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. It marked his 12th race win and first in the season-opener.

“What an amazing job by everyone at Chip Ganassi Racing, HRC, everybody (working on) the 10 car,” Palou told FOX Sports. “They gave me everything I needed this weekend to win. I told you yesterday that we had a really fast car. I was looking forward to the race.

“It’s huge,” he later added. “I’m super happy. We’ve been working really, really hard. It’s been a place where we’ve struggled a lot in the past, especially me personally. So to start with a win in 2025 is amazing.”

There were two key moments that led the 27-year-old to the top of the podium, including one in the opening seconds of the race. A lap 1 crash for Will Power, Nolan Siegel and Louis Foster opened the door for an early pit stop.

During the first (and only) caution, many drivers that elected to start on the softer alternate tire pitted for a switch to the primary tire.

Colton Herta, Andretti Global (Photo by: Penske Entertainment)

Different strategies emerge

That tire change proved to be the winning strategy. The alternate tire was quick to give up grip and pace, forcing those running on it to pit road after only a handful of laps. Each team had to complete at least two laps on the alternate, so those that started on primaries had to sneak in a short run on the alternate while teams that pitted early were free to make full runs on the primaries.

Palou emerged third among those that pitted, trailing Colton Herta and Scott Dixon. But Herta’s day was undone by a pair of pit road issues and Palou was able to move ahead of Dixon with an undercut on the final set of stops, freeing him to march on to another race win.

Josef Newgarden followed the same strategy and surged past Dixon into turn 1 after his last stop to take second. Lapped traffic held up Palou and allowed Newgarden to close in on his rear wing in the closing laps, but the Tennessean couldn’t find a way by before the checkered flag flew.

Instead it was Dixon that marched forward, sneaking past Newgarden on the final lap as he ran out of fuel and slowed. Newgarden survived to the checkered flag to complete the podium, with Scott McLaughlin and Kyle Kirkwood wrapping up the top-five. Marcus Ericsson, Felix Rosenqvist, Christian Lundgaard, Rinus Veekay and Alexander Rossi capped off the top-10.

Title hopeful Pato O'Ward rallied from a 23rd-place qualifying effort and an early puncture to salvage an 11th-place result. Herta was relegated to 16th behind him, his day undone by an issue with the right-rear tire on a stop and an extra trip to pit road required by a fuel issue.

The Lap 1 incident brought out the only caution on the day. Meyer Shank Racing’s Marcus Armstrong caught the wall and had to go to the garage area for a tow link replacement, but did so without eliciting another yellow.

IndyCar will be back in action on March 23 at The Thermal Club.