The reigning and two-time IndyCar Series champion, Palou recovered from getting behind early and utilized a sensational in-lap and out-lap on his strategy to secure the lead in the penultimate round of pitstops and march to a 6.6106s victory on the 2.439-mile, 14-turn circuit.
Palou, who came in as the defending race winner, led 39 of the 85 laps en route to collecting his first win of the season, and 10th of his IndyCar career. Additionally, the victory vaulted Palou into the overall lead in the championship standings.
“Yeah, a little mistake on that start, lost our first position there that we fight so hard in qualifying,” Palou said. “Everybody, all the crew engineers and the mechanics did an amazing job in the pits, gave me that lead and we just had to try and get the performance we had all weekend with the No. 10 DHL Honda car.
“It was an amazing win. It’s great to be back-to-back from last year and we’re gonna continue this one.”
Team Penske’s Will Power finished second, with Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s Christian Lundgaard, who led 35 laps, claiming third.
Six-time series champion Scott Dixon ended up fourth, ahead of Chip Ganassi Racing team-mate Marcus Armstrong.
Team Penske’s Scott McLaughlin climbed from 13th to finish sixth, while Andretti Global’s Colton Herta charged from an early incident – clashing with his new team-mate Marcus Ericsson – and a 24th-place start to grab seventh.
Arrow McLaren’s Alexander Rossi, who endured an engine change after the morning warm-up, came home eighth.
Graham Rahal (Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing) and Felix Rosenqvist (Meyer Shank Racing) rounded out the rest of the top 10.
Although Palou started on pole, he went wide into Turn 1 and left the door open for Lundgaard to squeeze by and grab the lead.
While the start was straightforward for the majority of the frontrunners, it stacked up behind with a melee of cars going off in the opening corner.
The start also featured contact between Andretti Global team-mates as Ericsson and Herta, who started 21st and 24th, respectively. Running side-by-side, the two touched, which sent Herta off course briefly before gathering it back up. Ericsson was forced to give up five positions after being penalized for the contact by Race Control.
There was also a continuation of the building rivalry between Romain Grosjean and Santino Ferrucci, with the two tangling again in Turn 11 while battling for 17th on the second lap. This time, though, Ferrucci pushed wide and Grosjean was forced off into the grass in Turn 12.
Everything at the front remained unchanged as Lundgaard led Palou, followed by Power through the opening series of pit stops. Power went for the undercut on lap 18, trading the harder primary tires for a fresh set of softer alternates.
Lundgaard and Palou came in together on lap 20, with Lundgaard swapping primaries for scuffed alternates, with Palou trading scuff alternates for scuff primaries.
Lundgaard retained the lead but Palou came under fire as Power came roaring behind and then past to take second in Turn 7 on lap 21.
The top three remained close until the next series of pit stops, which saw Power once again the first to dive in for service on lap 40 and take a used set of alternates. Lundgaard pitted the following lap for scuffed primaries.
Palou stayed out for an additional lap to go for the overcut and took used alternates, which worked out as he took the lead after things cycled out. Power fell to third behind Lundgaard with the lapped car of Ericsson temporarily between the two.
Despite the early incident and combating a bad starting position, Herta was able to rebound and rise up into the backend of the top 10 using a slightly altered strategy, with fresh primaries at the beginning before utilizing fresh alternates the next two stops. He climbed to ninth with 21 laps to go.
Palou led Lundgaard, Power and Scott Dixon down pit lane on lap 62.
Power, who swapped to used alternates, was able to leapfrog Lundgaard – on fresh alternates – during the stop and move to second. Palou took fresh primaries, while team-mate Dixon moved to fresh alternates.
The first and only caution of the day came out with 20 laps to go for Dale Coyne Racing’s Luca Ghiotto being stalled on track.
This set up a restart with 17 to go, with Palou leading Power, Lundgaard, Dixon, Marcus Armstrong and Scott McLaughlin.
The restart saw a frantic push for the lead by Power, who left himself open and had to shift to quickly defend Lundgaard, which he did.
The man on the move was Herta, who restarted ninth but climbed up to seventh by the end of the lap.
With 14 laps to go, Palou was quickly able to build a lead of 1.7s over Power.
Palou managed to stretch the lead to over 5s and remained uncontested in the sprint to the finish.
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