08/30/26 06:31:00
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08/30 18:29 CDT Palou wins his record-tying 4th consecutive IndyCar season
hampionship
Palou wins his record-tying 4th consecutive IndyCar season hampionship
WEST ALLIS, Wis (AP) --- Alex Palou won his record-tying fourth consecutive
IndyCar season championship with a 10th-place finish Sunday night in the
resumption of a rain-delayed race at the Milwaukee Mile.
The 29-year-old from Barcelona, Spain, added to yet another dominating year for
himself and Chip Ganassi Racing.
Palou's four consecutive championships match the record set by Sebastien
Bourdais from 2004-07. He becomes just the third driver to win five titles, ,
with A.J. Foyt winning seven and Scott Dixon six.
It's also a record-setting 18th title won by a Ganassi driver, one more than
Team Penske.
Palou finished fifth in Sunday's regularly scheduled race. In 17 races this
season, he has six wins, 12 top-five finishes and 14 top-10 results.
IndyCar completed 90 of the scheduled 250 laps at the 1.015-mile oval on
Saturday before the race was postponed because of rain and wet track
conditions. The IndyCar season finale is next weekend at Laguna Seca in
California.
Palou was coming off a 2025 season in which he won eight races, including his
first and only Indy 500 title.
Most impressive has been his consistency. Over the past two seasons, he hasn't
had back-to-back finishes outside the top 10 in 33 races. He was 20th in the
Freedom 250 Grand Prix in Washington, D.C. last weekend, only the third time in
two years he ended up 20th or worse.
The championship caps a year that began with a London's High Court ordering
Palou to pay McLaren Racing more than $12 million in a breach of contract suit
the team filed when the Spaniard backed out of two different deals with the
racing team.
Palou has instead stuck with Ganassi, the team he joined in 2021 after spending
his rookie IndyCar season with Dale Coyle Racing. In May, Palou signed a
multiyear contract extension with Ganassi to continue their relationship beyond
the previous deal that ran through the end of 2027.
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