Champ Already Has Eyes on Sixth Title After Milwaukee Clincher

Did someone count the number of celebratory car revolutions Alex Palou made Sunday evening at the Milwaukee Mile after clinching his fifth NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship and record-tying fourth in succession?

If the tire smoke didn’t deceive the eyes, it was five – one for each of those season titles.

SEE: Palou Championship Fast Facts

It wasn’t an amazing set of two-race results for Palou during the Snap-on INDYCAR Weekend, but it was more than enough to take another amazing step on his climb up U.S. open-wheel racing’s all-time ladder.

Only A.J. Foyt (with seven season championships) and Scott Dixon (with six) stand above the Spaniard. Palou’s title tied Sebastien Bourdais’ record for consecutive crowns, and it gave Chip Ganassi Racing a record 18th season title, passing Team Penske.

“It's tough to put into words,” Palou said of this extended run of excellence. “Everything that I owe to this team, to these two men sitting next to me (team owner Chip Ganassi and strategist Barry Wanser). They give me the opportunity to be not only a race winner, then a champion, now a five-time champion.

“It's been incredible. I just feel like we just started yesterday. We're just getting closer and closer. We're having more fun and more fun each day. It's been an absolute joy of a year. The last two years have been just magical for us.”

Palou secured the title ahead of the season’s final race, the second year he has done that. He will officially hoist the Astor Challenge Cup following next weekend’s Mission Grand Prix of Monterey at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca (Sunday, 2:30 p.m. ET, FOX, FOX Deportes, FOX One).

Sunday’s two-race affair wasn’t one of Palou’s best – he finished fifth and 10th – but it was more than enough for the job at hand. He entered the weekend with a 91-point advantage on Andretti Global’s Kyle Kirkwood, who similarly did not have a strong showing. He finished sixth and 15th.

In fact, Kirkwood’s struggles, coupled with the career-best oval runs of Arrow McLaren’s Christian Lundgaard – he finished third and sixth, allowed the two to swap places in the standings. With Palou safely owning the season crown, the race for second place will be a doozy at Laguna Seca. Lundgaard, Kirkwood and Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward are separated by just four points. Palou’s lead is 100 points.

Palou spent most of Sunday’s races in protection mode. More often than not, he opted to occupy the safer inside lane, avoiding the excess tire rubber that loomed just off the outer lane. That was a hot spot that caught out Andretti Global’s Will Power, among others.

Palou knew all he had to do on this day was bring the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda home in one piece, and that’s what he did.

“Today was a really bad race for us, like we were suffering all the time,” he said. “But I was just like, ‘Keep focused, keep on going.’ Anyways, it was great, man, great to have another championship.

“Yeah, ready for the next one.”

Ganassi said more titles can come because of Palou’s uncompromised drive to win.

“I think you see it in their eyes,” he said of the common denominator of the champions his team has employed. “I mean, it sounds like a small thing, but it's not. I see it in these drivers' eyes. They have a desire. They have good vision. They have a drive to succeed. You see it in their eyes all the time.

“You see it in Alex's.”

Consider that Palou won’t turn 30 until after the third race of next season. Foyt was 40 when he won his sixth title, Dixon was 39 when he his sixth.

While Andretti Global made big strides this season and Arrow McLaren will reload with a pair of Indianapolis 500 winners (Dixon and Felix Rosenqvist) after a season in which it has already won five races, including O’Ward’s two on Sunday, Palou again figures to be the driver to beat given that the equipment package remains the same for one more year.

Palou won eight races en route to last year’s title, and his count this year stands at six. That’s 14 wins in 34 races, and while Sunday’s first race wasn’t a thing of beauty, it was his 12th top-five finish in 17 starts. He was proud to call Laguna Seca his favorite track, a road course where he has won three of the past four races, including the past two.

Coincidentally, those tire burnouts Palou did Sunday on the front straightaway were in honor of Alex Zanardi, the two-time INDYCAR SERIES champion who died May 1. Zanardi won those titles with CGR, so the team decided to honor him by wrapping Palou’s car at Laguna Seca in Zanardi’s famous red with a yellow lightning bolt.

It just so happens that Zanardi and Palou are two of Laguna Seca’s greatest champions, combining for four race wins and Zanardi’s famous pass of Bryan Herta in The Corkscrew turn complex.

Ganassi said he now sees it’s possible for Palou to become the sport’s most accomplished champion, passing even the likes of Foyt and Dixon.

“Absolutely,” he said. “I mean, you’d be crazy not to believe that, yeah. I wouldn’t want to bet against (him), I know that.”