Kyle Kirkwood isn’t “in the hunt” with Alex Palou yet, but “can’t let him win any more races” either

Sunday, Alex Palou’s perfect season took a hit when David Malukas took him out of the race heading into turn one during a restart on the streets of Detroit, nudging the No. 10 Honda into the tire barrier on the outside wall.

Palou was not showing much promise as a podium contender prior to the incident on lap 72 of the scheduled 100 laps, but he was still on track to earn more points than he did by finishing 25th.

Kirkwood, the only other driver, apart from Palou, to have won a race this season heading into the Detroit Grand Prix, immediately knew he needed to capitalize on Palou’s retirement, as this is a rare event, not just in 2025, but in modern IndyCar. It was the Spaniard’s first DNF in almost a year — Race 1 of the Iowa Speedway doubleheader in July 2024 — and just the third race he didn’t finished since the start of the 2022 season.  

“No, he (No. 27 race strategist Bryan Herta) didn’t tell me, but I knew it. I shouldn’t be smiling thinking that, but I knew that he crashed, and I knew that we needed to capitalize on some points today given the outcome for him. I don’t know what happened with him, and I feel bad for him, but this also does help us a lot with the points”, Kirkwood said after the race in Detroit.

Kyle Kirkwood, Andretti Global

Photo by: Penske Entertainment

Kirkwood arrived in Detroit fifth in IndyCar’s standings, 150 points behind Palou after he lost his sixth place Indy 500 finish when his No. 27 car and his teammate Marcus Ericsson’s No. 28 car failed their post-race technical inspections and were reordered to the back of the field. After winning in Detroit, the Floridian moved up to third place, 102 points behind.

“Super important”, Kirkwood insisted about winning in a day where Palou couldn’t complete the race, “but we’ve got to keep doing it. Still, we saw it, he can skip out on still a handful more races and be absolutely fine”.

“This race sometimes brings out the best and worst in some people, and unfortunately for him he ended up in the wall, but it actually helps us a lot in the championship, puts us — we’re not really still in the hunt, I wouldn’t say. I could imagine, but it at least gives you a taste of, ‘ooh, maybe we can claw back at this’, which is pretty cool”.

“That’s still a mile away (102 points), but it puts you back in a position where you feel like you might be able to get that back. But I’m sure we’re going to go to road courses and Palou is going to do his thing. So we’ll see what happens”.

With the IndyCar series heading to the oval at World Wide Technology Raceway in Illinois in two weeks, then moving on to road courses at Road America and Mid-Ohio, Kirkwood isn’t afraid of what Palou could achieve there.

“Not as much as, like, Barber, Indy GP, Thermal, because that’s where he’s been dominant in previous years, so fortunately we’re through some of those races with him. But yeah, Mid-Ohio, Road America, Laguna, places like that, we know he’s strong, but we also know that we’re strong, too, and we’ve had a lot of success there in previous years. We’ve just got to get back to our winning ways there because we can’t let him win any more races”.