INDIANAPOLIS – Both jokingly and seriously, IndyCar observers have suggested Alex Palou has luck on his side as he’s dominated the series. After all, that’s the easiest way for many to explain why Palou has won three straight IndyCar titles and the most recent Indianapolis 500.
Friday evening was the rare moment when it appeared luck wasn’t on Palou’s side. Palou’s wife, Esther, drew the random number of when Palou would qualify in the 33-car order. It was 31st.
With cars getting only one attempt to make the Top 12 after Saturday’s qualifying session was washed out, Palou and drivers in his qualifying range were put at a disadvantage, as they couldn’t do their attempt until almost 2.5 hours after the session started when the conditions at Indianapolis Motor Speedway were much warmer and sunnier than those who did their attempt closer to noon.
The change in conditions led to concerns whether Palou, who’s favored to win his second straight Indy 500, would even make the Top 12 round of qualifying. This time, with the luck going against him, Palou did just enough to advance, finishing 11th of 12th and bumping two-time Indy 500 champion Takuma Sato out of the Top 12.
After that, no luck was needed.
Palou finished second behind Meyer Shank Racing’s Felix Rosenqvist, who had the fastest speed in the opening round and Top 12, but the Spaniard was easily in the Fast Six. Ed Carpenter Racing’s Alexander Rossi kickstarted the Fast Six with a miraculous run at 231.990 mph, and it looked like Rossi might win his first Indy 500 pole.
Until Palou happened.
“You cannot do anything about it,” Palou said of drawing the third-to-last spot in the first round of qualifying. “A draw is a draw. It’s the same for everyone. We were a bit unlucky. We were close to being lucky if we would have qualified yesterday, but still, it’s the same for everyone.
“I’m just glad that we still had a good car that allowed us to make it into the Fast 12, which was the biggest target today, just to try and get on those first rows for the start. But we did not expect to be here on pole today.”
Palou and the No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda beat out Rossi with an average speed of 232.248 mph to win his second pole for the Indy 500 after doing so in 2023. Palou now positions himself to mimic what Josef Newgarden did in 2023 and 2024 by winning back-to-back Indy 500s.
“I think pole is huge,” Palou said. “The emotion, the momentum and everything that comes with it, it’s incredible, but it’s totally different to the race. That doesn’t guarantee us to having an easier race. It guarantees us to have the best view heading into the first corner but that’s about it.”
Many drivers and teams entered Sunday with a more conservative attitude, wanting to keep their cars safe without the fear of bumping and ensure that no repairs were needed in the week leading into the race. Once Palou made it into the Top 12, he could’ve taken a similar mindset, as it’s a given that the No. 10 will be among the fastest on track come race day.
But Palou and his crew opted to continue trimming his car each round, reducing its downforce to create more speed. Palou claimed he had the “most trimmed car out there” in the Fast Six, which led to him outdueling Rossi.
“We had the chance to trim it, to go aggressive and to see if we’re going to be able to make an on pole or not,” he said. “And just because we made those adjustments — those decisions — we were able to get the pole.”
Half of Palou’s dominance is about what he does in the cockpit. The other half comes from the trust he and his team have built with each other in his sixth year at Chip Ganassi Racing. From the engineering crew led by Julian Robertson, to his pit crew, to his strategist Barry Wanser and timing stand, Palou trusts what others at CGR tell him and just focuses on completing the job inside the car.
Four days before winning the pole, Palou was the last car on track for practice, as he drove until race control waved the checkered flag at 6 p.m. Despite driving the second-quickest lap of the day and seemingly having everything in control, Palou’s team made him drive the most laps and stay on track until he couldn’t anymore.
“I think it’s everybody at CGR that just is obsessed with winning,” Palou said Friday morning. “Not obsessed, but that’s the work that we want to do, everybody at the shop. … I think if they would have kept the track open throughout the night, we would have been running.”
Palou, who has already won three of IndyCar’s six races, will look to further cement his status as an IndyCar and Indy 500 legend. He enters race week with a win, two poles, and five consecutive top 10 finishes under his belt in The Greatest Spectacle in Racing. The next few days will entail Palou again trusting his team to get the car from qualifying shape to race shape.
“It’s a different story,” Palou said of the upcoming race. “Completely different story to what we did today or what we did last year. We just need to build a completely new race car, a race car that is capable of overtaking the cars that are racing this year, to see if there’s something that suits me a little bit more, see if we can get close to them, overtake them if we can have a pass up front. So yeah, I’m excited to go out on Monday and Friday on practice and see if we can get the car towards what we need.”
What Palou accomplished this Sunday guarantees him nothing for next Sunday. But by starting on the inside position of the front row, he’ll have a better chance than anyone to hold the Borg-Warner trophy again.
Zion Brown is IndyStar’s motorsports reporter. Follow him at @z10nbr0wn. Get IndyStar’s motor sports coverage sent directly to your inbox with our Motor Sports newsletter. Subscribe to the YouTube channel IndyStar TV: IndyCar for a behind-the-scenes look at IndyCar and expert analysis.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: No luck needed as Alex Palou wins Indy 500 pole for second time
Reporting by Zion Brown, Indianapolis Star / Indianapolis Star
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