Alex Palou is the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series Champion

The NTT IndyCar Series concluded the weekend at Portland International Raceway on Sunday afternoon in the Bitnile.com Grand Prix of Portland. This was the second to last race of the season. Coming into this race, the championship was down to two Chip Ganassi Racing drivers Alex Palou, who had a 74-point lead over Scott Dixon.

RLL Racing driver Graham Rahal started the race on the pole with Team Penske’s Scott McLaughlin starting second. For McLaughlin, this was his 50^th career IndyCar race. Alex Palou started in fifth, and Scott Dixon started fourth.

From the drop of the green flag, Palou was on the move. He passed Dixon and Colton Herta on the first lap to get into the third position. Behind them, there was chaos when Callum Ilott went into the grass, kicking up dust. Romain Grosjean was on the outside battling Rinus VeeKay for position before sliding onto the dirt and hitting Ilott.

Grosjean damaged the left front suspension and went to pit road. His crew worked on it for several laps before getting him out on the track again but that did not last long. He was out there for several laps before returning to pit road and his day was done. He finished in 27^th place.

Up front, Will Power got loose at Turn 4 trying to pass Alexander Rossi for position before coming to a stop which led to the first caution on third lap. The track crew were able to get him fired up again and he rejoined the race. Graham Rahal led the opening 21 laps before the first round of pit stops were underway. Rahal never led again.

Alex Palou was the new leader after the first pit cycles were complete. On lap 30, the teammates of Felix Rosenqvist and Pato O’Ward nearly collided at Turn 1 battling for the third position but managed to avoid each other.

Later in the race, Scott Dixon was the new leader, while Palou was sitting in seventh place. On lap 50, race control reviewed Alex Palou’s actions when he initially blocked Helio Castroneves. But they determined he did not block him and he kept his position.

Nine laps later, Dixon made his second pit stop which started the next round of pit stops. Alex Palou, who pitted on lap 48, was the new leader. With 29 laps to go, Marcus Armstrong’s crew forgot to tighten up the right rear tire and it came off as he was pulling away from his pit box. His crew pulled him back to his pit, tightened the right rear, and restarted his car before sending him back out on the track.

Two laps later Agustin Canapino had brake issues before going off the track and sitting on the grass at Turn 10 which led to the second caution of the race. He was the second car out and finished in 26^th place. Alex Palou was the leader when the final restart happened on lap 88.

Behind them, Alexander Rossi went to the outside to pass Marcus Ericsson but made contact and he damaged the front wing. Rossi went to pit road to get a new front wing. Moving ahead with three laps to go, Palou had a 5.3-second lead. That was in jeopardy when Colton Herta spun around at Turn 6. He was able to get his car restarted and the race continued.

Alex Palou dominated this race, leading 69 laps to win his fifth race of the season by 5.4353 seconds over Flex Rosenqvist. With the win, Alex Palou wins the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series championship with one race to go. His teammate, Scott Dixon, finished third and will finish in second place in the championship standings. This is Palou’s second IndyCar championship.

“That’s what we wanted. It was an amazing weekend overall. We had really fast cars. We knew we had to go for it, and we just raced how we’ve been doing all season,” said Palou. “Super proud to be here in victory lane and super proud of the second championship. I never thought that I would be an IndyCar champion, and to be a two-time IndyCar champion feels amazing, like a dream.”

“First of all, congrats to the 10-car (Palou) group, Chip, and the whole team to secure a one-two (championship standings) going into the last race. It’s pretty special,” said Dixon. “I don’t know if we had enough speed for Alex. He was definitely fast.”

“I was kind of lucky in the end, first off with the yellow that we just managed to do our stop before,” said Felix Rosenqvist. “And then also at the end, we kind of had a buffer with lapped cars that gave us a little bit of a cushion to Scott at the end. It kind of worked out our way for the first time in a while, so I was enjoying the race a lot.”

This is Chip Ganassi’s 15^th IndyCar Championship and the first one-two finish in the championship standings since 2009 when Scott Dixon won the title over Dario Franchitti. The other drives to have won championships with CGR are Jimmy Vasser, Alex Zanardi (2x), Juan Pablo Montoya, Dario Franchitti (3x), and Scott Dixon (6x).

The last time a driver won the championship ahead of the season finale was Sebastian Bourdais in the Champ Car World Series in 2007 at Surfers Paradise, Australia.

The NTT IndyCar Series season finale is next Sunday from WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca at 2:30 pm on NBC. Subscribe to Fubo to watch all of the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series season. Purchase tickets for all IndyCar races today on StubHub and Viagogo.

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