Palou actually loses an IndyCar race (Kirkwood wins it)

Kyle Kirwood took a dominant victory in Detroit and a second win of the season, in a typically bizarre IndyCar street race which included runaway points leader Alex Palou being taken out while in podium contention.

Still only two drivers have won this year with Palou and Kirkwood, and Honda has swept all seven races, with this one coming in Chevrolet's Detroit backyard.

Such was the nature of the race that five drivers who started 15th or worse ended up in the top 10.

Leading finishers

1 Kyle Kirkwood (Andretti)
2 Santino Ferrucci (Foyt) +3.5931s
3 Colton Herta (Andretti) +4.9427s
4 Will Power (Penske) +5.4488s
5 Kyffin Simpson (Ganassi) +6.2189s
6 Marcus Armstrong (Meyer Shank) +8.5237s
7 Pato O'Ward (McLaren) +9.1683s
8 Christian Lundgaard (McLaren) +9.7823s
9 Josef Newgarden (Penske) +18.7691s
10 Alexander Rossi (Carpenter) +19.4492s

Kirkwood had been jumped at the start by Palou, but dived past him and Christian Lundgaard on laps two and three respectively to take second, looked racey and looked good for the lead after passing polesitting Andretti team-mate Colton Herta.

Herta controlled the early running until his first stop when on his out-lap, an aggressive move at Turn 4 by McLaren’s Nolan Siegel pushed Herta wide and allowed Kirkwood through before the first caution of the race for a Turn 9 shunt for Felix Rosenqvist.

A divergence in strategy at that caution shook things up as the drivers who started on hard tyres stayed out under the caution and tried to stretch the stint as long as possible, with the softer tyre going off quickly, drivers needed to shorten their stint on them.

It was clear as the race reached halfway that those who stayed out early on would not be able to keep the soft-starters at bay with Kirkwood ahead of the pack.

Will Power had miraculously leapt into second as he had pitted just as that first caution came out, negating his loss to the pack as they slowed and he was able to split Kirkwood and Herta.

Power was pressuring Herta but just as the final round of stops was expected, the wheel came off Callum Ilott’s car after a pit stop, setting up a crucial final stop.

The Kirkwood, Power, Herta, Palou and second-place starter David Malukas order remained, but they were jumped by Santino Ferrucci, Kyffin Simpson and Marcus Armstrong, a trio without an IndyCar win. They had stopped six laps before the caution and therefore cycled to the front.

On the restart from the Ilott caution with just under 30 laps to go, Malukas shunted Palou into the barriers at Turn 1 ending Palou’s run of top two finishes in the first six races and that continues the ‘curse’ of Indianapolis 500 winners struggling at the next race.

Palou was also taken out of this race last year - by then reigning Indy 500 winner Josef Newgarden - and a similar fate awaited Malukas as Newgarden, a drive-through penalty.

With a restart on lap 77 of 100, Kirkwood made rapid work of Marcus Armstrong and then passed Simpson a lap later, although he broke his rear wing clipping the left-rear of Simpson’s car.

On lap 79 he cleared Ferrucci on the run to Turn1 to make it a hat-trick of overtakes.

With 17 to go the finish was complicated further when rookie Louis Foster’s suspension broke at the fastest part of the track heading into Turn 1, he speared into the outside wall and then collected Rosenqvist while both were campaigning for a top 10, with both then having heavy barrier impacts.

Both drivers got out under their own power, Foster walked to the medical car and was quickly seen and released by medical, while Rosenqvist sat on his sidepod for a while before being taken away by stretcher. He said on the radio he had hurt his leg.

He has now been released and cleared.

It brought out a lengthy red flag to fix the barriers, before the race restarted with 11 laps to go.

Kirkwood got a perfect restart to run away with the lead, with Ferrucci and then Herta getting past Power with an epic move at Turn 9 which he had tried and failed, causing contact with Power, near the start of the race.

That battle allowed Ferrucci to build a gap but Herta reeled him back in. There was contact with four to go as Herta clipped Ferrucci’s rear heading into Turn 1, allowing Power to move back into touching distance.

That left Herta on the defensive, which he achieved successfully, but Ferrucci scarpered to take his best IndyCar finish in second - that's second two weeks in a row for AJ Foyt Racing, after a near 10-year wait for a finish that good - ahead of Herta, Power, Simpson (another career best finish) and Armstrong.

Kirkwood will obviously be happy with the win but must be thinking about the Indy 500 where he lost his sixth place finish after Andretti was penalised for modified Energy Management System covers, a part which is not allowed to be tweaked, after the race. It cost him 24 points which would have been enough to put him ahead of Pato O’Ward in the points.

With Palou’s retirement, his lead is reduced to 90 points ahead of O’Ward who took seventh from 18th, and Josef Newgarden took ninth from 24th, sandwiching O'Ward's McLaren team-mate Christian Lundgaard.

ECR's Alexander Rossi rounded out the top 10 with a late move on Scott Dixon.

A word for Scott McLaughlin, who pitted under the first caution and led the strategy that won the race before he got the penalty for spinning Siegel on the restart, and recovered to 12th.