Palou goes three in a row with dominant drive at Mid-Ohio

Chip Ganassi Racing’s 2021 champion Alex Palou is now looking unassailable at the halfway point in the 2023 IndyCar championship after scoring his fourth win of the year in the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio.

Palou was chased home by Dixon who is now up to second in the championship after their teammate Marcus Ericsson crashed out on the opening lap, Josef Newgarden had difficult run to 13th, and Pato O’Ward’s three-stop strategy from the back of the field elevated him only to eighth. Will Power claimed the final podium spot.

The top three on the grid, Andretti Autosport’s Colton Herta, Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s Graham Rahal and another Andretti driver, Kyle Kirkwood, elected to start on the Firestone’s softer red-sidewall alternate tires as did fifth place starter Christian Lundgaard of RLL. Runaway championship leader Palou went to the grid on primaries as did CGR teammate Scott Dixon, and fourth-row starters Will Power and Scott McLaughlin of Team Penske, the top Chevrolet-powered starters. The Swedes on row five, Marcus Ericsson (Ganassi) and Felix Rosenqvist (Arrow McLaren) would also begin on the harder tires.

The start of the race, as ever, was on the back straight, through the kink of Turn 3 down to the second gear right-hander Turn 4.

All went well until Ericsson and Rosenqvist, who had outbraked Power on either side at Turn 4, collided at Turn 6, as Ericsson understeered at Turn 6 and struck the McLaren. Rosenqvist was able to get a bumpstart, but Ericsson’s steering was way off and he limped to the pits.

Herta had retained P1 and led the field to the lap six restart ahead of Rahal, Kirkwood, Palou, Lundgaard, Dixon, McLaughlin, David Malukas of Dale Coyne Racing w/HMD, Power and Jack Harvey (RLL). The restart was mercifully clean, the only significant order change being Romain Grosjean passing Alexander Rossi for 11th at the Keyhole, Turn 2. Further back, Pato O’Ward, who had started from 25th after a mistake in qualifying, had used his alternates to climb to 19th. By lap 10, he was into 17th.

On lap nine, McLaughlin was ordered by race control to cede position, having blocked Malukas on the run down to Turn 2.

Up front, Herta wasn’t shaking off Rahal, but by lap 15 the pair had pulled two seconds on Kirkwood who was being trailed closely by Palou, Lundgaard and Dixon. On lap 17, Palou’s more durable Firestones allowed him to make a challenge around the outside of Kirkwood into Turn 4. It didn’t work, but it was clearly the point in the race when primaries gained the edge over alternates. To this end, McLaughlin re-passed Malukas for seventh, while O’Ward, who had climbed to 14th but couldn’t quite pull off a pass on Josef Newgarden, ducked into the pits for his first stop and took on primaries.

Next time by, Palou got his outside pass at Turn 4 on Kirkwood done, and the Andretti driver spun. A couple of laps later he pitted for primaries. A lap later, Newgarden also stopped, while Palou hunted down Herta and Rahal, pulling 2.4 ahead of Lundgaard.

Herta went to the end of lap 27 before making his first stop, but Rahal stayed out one more lap before taking the hard tires, releasing Palou to set as big a gap as possible. Behind, McLaughlin also made his first stop, while Palou went a lap longer before taking on his red-sidewall tires. He emerged easily in front of Herta who had passed Rahal on the latter’s out lap, the RLL driver also falling victim to the charging O’Ward who had clearly committed to a three-stop strategy.

The big winners in the strategic battle had been Dixon and Power who had gone to lap 30 before pitting for alternates. They emerged just ahead of Herta, and while the erstwhile leader on warm tires was able to outbrake both of them on, at Turns 2 and 4 respectively, Dixon and Power were now in legitimate third and fifth, once O’Ward outbraked Power for fourth.

So on lap 35 of 80, Palou on alternates was over 6s ahead of primary-tired Herta, with Dixon on alternates in a very close third, O’Ward in fourth 1.5s behind but two seconds ahead of Power. In sixth was Lundgaard, who had jumped teammate Rahal when the No. 15 RLL suffered a tardy stop. McLaughlin, Rossi and Malukas completed the top 10 at this time.

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O’Ward pitted for his second of three stops on lap 43, and rejoined 14th, behind Newgarden. Meanwhile up front, Palou’s 8.3s lead on lap 40 started to ebb away as he got bottled behind Benjamin Pedersen of AJ Foyt Racing who didn’t wish to be lapped. By lap 48, the leader’s advantage was down to 3.8s, while Herta had his mirrors full of Dixon, who had pulled out a 4.5s margin over Power.

Once Palou finally passed Pedersen, he immediately delivered a couple of fast laps and stretched his lead once more, leaving Herta far more concerned with the Ganassi car behind him, that of Dixon. However, the six-time champion and six-time Mid-Ohio winner ducked into the pits for more primaries on lap 53, with Palou doing the same after getting his lead out to 7.5s over Herta.

When Herta made his final stop, he broke the pitlane speed limit, and with the consequent drive-through penalty, his challenge was over, dropping to 13th. Rahal was last of the frontrunners to stop and unfortunately his crew suffered a wheelgun failure, and he emerged in seventh, and almost immediately lost this spot to Malukas.

With 20 laps to go, all the frontrunners were on primaries, Palou leading by 6s over O’Ward – who still had to make another stop, and by nine over Dixon, 15 over Power, and 16 over Lundgaard. O’Ward hit pit road for the third time at the end of lap 64, taking on fresh primary tires and emerged in ninth, but swiftly made that eighth as his teammate Rossi up ahead could not find away around the unnecessarily obstructive Pedersen, and O’Ward’s fresh tires allowed him to get past both of them. Rossi also lost out to the Ganassi car of Marcus Armstrong, slipping to tenth, but was protected from the rear by the one-lap-down teammate Rosenqvist.

With five laps to go, Palou held a 9s lead over Dixon who had a dozen seconds on Power, who was playing cat’n’mouse on push-to-pass with the closely pursuing Lundgaard, who in turn was trying to hold back McLaughlin.

Palou paid out the line in the closing laps, crossing the line 5s ahead of Dixon, who had 13s on Power, Lundgaard and McLaughlin.

Malukas took a quiet but impressive sixth ahead of Rahal and O’Ward, while Armstrong was ninth and Rossi 10th. A dynamic battle between DeFrancesco, Newgarden and Grosjean in the closing laps, saw the Penske driver pull off a brilliant opportunist pass at Turn 11, to claim twelfth place, while Grosjean also deposed his teammate who nonetheless held on ahead of Ed Carpenter Racing’s Rinus VeeKay.

Conor Daly, subbing for Simon Pagenaud, beat his new teammate Helio Castroneves to take 20th, but couldn’t get past the occupant of his old seat at ECR, Ryan Hunter-Reay.

Palou now holds a 110-point lead over Dixon, who has six points on Newgarden.

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Story originally appeared on Racer