For some reason, the top three drivers, Palou along with Scott McLaughlin and Josef Newgarden, did not come to the pit lane under that final caution despite all the teams having a set of tires remaining. Every other lead lap car stopped, and it set up a thrilling finish, the likes we haven't really seen since Iowa 2014.
Palou and company would have some buffer of the lapped cars to those on fresher tires, but with just over 30 laps to go when the race restarted, they would eventually lose that protection and it would be down to whether or not time would be on their side.
Patricio O'Ward was in fourth, the first car on new tires, but Alexander Rossi quickly dispatched O'Ward. However, as they battled with traffic, Christian Rasmussen clawed his way forward and passed both O'Ward and Rossi, and Rasmussen was soon the leader of those on new tires.
Rasmussen got through Newgarden and he was up to second ahead of McLaughlin with 20 laps to go. It felt like time was on Rasmussen's side, but Palou tried his best to outrun the Dane. However, the tire advantage inevitably swung in Rasmussen's favor. Palou did all he could to hold off Rasmussen, but Rasmussen made his move and took the lead with 15 laps to go.
Palou fought back and kept it close, but the tires were gone. Paou was never going to have enough to counter the pass Rasmussen had completed.
However, Rasmussen might have been his own worst enemy and greatest obstacle to victory, pushing the car to the limit as he has become known for doing. He kept making risky moves, including lapping Felix Rosenqvist to the outside on exit of turn two. The tires were in his favor, but this race was not settled strictly because it was unclear if Rasmussen, in an unknown position, would step over the edge and cost himself the greatest day of his career.
Despite the twitches and the quick reactionary moves, Rasmussen held on and took a stunning victory to make him the 300th winner in IndyCar history.
He drove really well in this race and was competitive. He was making passes, and he actually had to comeback from a pit lane speeding penalty early, but that occurred under caution and all he had to do was going to the rear of the field. This was going to be a top ten day for Rasmussen, but it would not have been a victory without a brief spritz of rain.
It is ironic enough that Rasmussen wins this race two weeks after he was under a microscope for his driving at Portland. He has essentially completed two full seasons in IndyCar, and what has stood out the most about Rasmussen is his aggression. He will put a car on the limit and take a competitor with him. There is never say die attitude from Rasmussen, but at times it can come off as unwarranted and risky to others on the track. There are plenty who are not thrilled to see him on track because he can be a little reckless.
Over his two years, Rasmussen has had good oval races, but he has mostly been mid-pack. That is kind of where Ed Carpenter Racing has been for an extended period of time. The form hasn't been the strongest on the road courses, but when it comes to ovals, Rasmussen has shined. This year alone he has been one of the best on ovals. Entering this race, three drivers had finished in the top ten of all four oval races, Patricio O'Ward, Palou and Rasmussen. Rasmussen had an aggressive drive lead to a podium at Gateway, but I don't think anyone saw a victory coming this season, not with the competition in this field.
Rasmussen looked good, but when you consider what the first 200 laps of this race looked like, it required an act of God for Rasmussen to win this race. It appears the Almighty wiped the sweat from his brow on this sabbath, and those drops fell on the Milwaukee Mile, blessing Rasmussen to accomplish the unthinkable.
2. Why didn't Álex Palou stop for tires? With 40 laps to go and under caution, it felt obvious to take tires. This final stint was going to be 54 laps, a little longer than most had drive all race. Taking tires under the caution would have meant at most 32 green flag laps would be run on this new set.
All I can think is Palou's team didn't want to be caught as the only driver to come in and restart 15th after leading all race. However, if Palou was the only car on new tires with 30 laps to go, I think he would have had a great shot of driving back to first before the checkered flag.
There was nothing Palou could do when Rasmussen got around McLaughlin. Palou drove probably the hardest he has driven all season, and the fact he was still within two seconds of Rasmussen at the checkered flag is impressive, but this one got away because Chip Ganassi Racing did not bring in Álex Palou for a set of tires that just said their unused.
If Palou stops, I still think a dozen other drivers stop and at worse Palou is restarting fourth or fifth. It is a shame that this one got away. Gone is a potential share of the record for most victories in a season, but that is a champagne problem for Palou and company. It has still been a great season, one of the best we have ever seen in IndyCar.
3. Scott McLaughlin still held on for third on his older tires.
This is one of those cases, and we see it once or twice a season on a road or street course, where the winner had the alternate strategy but then the next two or three drivers ran the typical strategy, and it seems like either was the right choice.
We had this last year with Scott Dixon at Long Beach. Dixon won stretching the fuel, but the next five drivers ran hard and finished ahead of the next driver who was stretching fuel, and that was Will Power in sixth. Did Scott Dixon run the right strategy or was Dixon the one guy to make it the alternate work while the other strategy appears to have been better considering the rest of the finishers behind the winner?
I think taking tires was the right choice. After all, there was over nine seconds between Palou in second and McLaughlin in third. McLaughlin wasn't close to victory, but he benefitted from some of the lapped cars and only Rasmussen made it through them in a quick fashion. By the time Alexander Rossi and Patricio O'Ward got through the traffic, their tires had lost their edge and McLaughlin could hold on for a podium and a good day.
4. Considering Alexander Rossi sprinted immediately to victory lane and met Rasmussen with his helmet still on, I doubt Rossi feels any regret that he didn't win this race and blew a chance to be the man driving into victory lap, though he was positioned to be that guy. Rossi was the top driver on the new tires until Rasmussen came blazing through. Rossi couldn't even pass McLaughlin. If he couldn't pass McLaughlin, Rossi wasn't going to win this race.
What Rossi is most excited about is he spent the entire race in the top ten and pushing for a top five result. He stopped early on the first pit cycle and it took him from the bottom of the top ten into the top five. He had to fight a bit, but he drove a stellar race.
Perhaps age played a role and a level of aggression you don't have after years of experience and knowing better allowed Rasmussen to take the risks required to win this race. Maybe Rossi knew better while Rasmussen had no clue and acted on instinct.
5. Patricio O'Ward came out of the pit lane first under that final caution, and he was fourth at the restart, but O'Ward lost that advantage immediately, and once it was gone, he was settled for a fight just to finish in the top five and not go for the victory.
O'Ward took a risk like the rest of them. The opportunity was there for fresh rubber and an extra pit stop would be the only way to win this race. If that caution doesn't come out and O'Ward finishes fifth, no one is looking at it as a disappointing result. We shouldn't either.
6. Christian Lundgaard had likely his best oval race. Lundgaard stopped early on the first pit cycle and jumped into the top ten, and he spent the rest of the race in a top ten spot. It was a good day. Sixth might have been a little better than expected. He needed a day like this though as he continues to develop on ovals.
7. Josef Newgarden slipped from third to seventh on his older tires. Newgarden made a nice save that cost him a few spots though. This one hurts because Newgarden should have been on the podium today. My question is if Team Penske had two of the top three, more specifically, if it had second and third, why didn't it split its strategies and have one car take tires while the other stayed out?
I don't understand how Penske missed that. Newgarden has had a wretched season. Why not roll the dice and be on the offensive in the closing laps? With ten or 15 laps to go, I could understand not stopping, but there was going to be about 30 laps to go when the race restarted, and those tires the top three had on were asked to go a little longer than anyone dared earlier in the race. The safe strategy was stopping.
This stinks because it was a missed opportunity, and one the likes of Tim Cindric would not have overlooked.
8. David Malukas salvaged his day with an eighth-place finish. Malukas ran well and was in the top five. Then in the middle of the race, an air gun issue caused Malukas to lose a lap as the team could not get the right front tire secured in a quick fashion. He spent much of the second half of the race outside the top fifteen. However, IndyCar's overly forgiving wave around rules got Malukas back on the lead lap and he could benefit from taking tires on that final caution. He drove to finish eighth but this will feel like a missed opportunity.
Malukas led early from Palou, but Palou had the better car. Malukas wasn't beating Palou in a straight-up fight. Nobody was beating Palou straight-up today. Either way, Malukas likely believed he should have been competing for a podium spot and finishing ahead of at least one Team Penske driver. Instead, he finished ahead of none. It was a good recovery for something that was out of his control.
9. Scott Dixon didn't have the best day and he finished ninth. It felt like Dixon was between 12th and 14th this entire race. He never really went forward after starting 14th due to his grid penalty. He didn't make any big moves in this race. It never was quite his day.
10. Marcus Armstrong pulled out a miraculous tenth-place finish because the team decided not to stop with just over 100 laps to go, the only car not to stop under that caution. Armstrong went from first to about ninth in a lap and he was down to 17th in about ten laps. It looked like the dumbest decision of the season, and he was going to finish a lap or two down in 18th after being just outside the top ten for most of the race.
However, that spritz blessed more than just Rasmussen. Armstrong was back on the lead lap, he could take that extra set of new tires, and he was able to drive to a top ten finish. The team "tried something different" by not stopping under that caution when staying out meant it was still a two-stop race from that point. It was a ballsy choice when it was clearly going to fail. The pit stand caught a break today.
11. Colton Herta was 11th and Kyle Kirkwood was 12th. This was a better day than these results will show for each driver. Herta drove up to sixth from 24th on the grid, and he appeared to be a contender for a top five finish. Kirkwood spent most of the race in the top ten. However, both drivers lost spots in that final pit cycle and it appears both drivers were elbowed out of the top ten in the sprint to the finish. I am surprised it happened to Herta because he was moving forward the entire race.
It has been an odd end of the season for Andretti Global. Herta wasn't confident in his car after practice, was upset about his qualifying spin but brushed it off because he felt he wasn't going to be starting that well anyway, and then he was probably one of the best four or five drivers on track today, only to be freight-trained in the final sprint to the finish.
Kirkwood drove well today but not great. He was going to finish eighth or ninth without that last caution. Not a great day, but a fine day, however Kirkwood has won three times this season and he hasn't been close to a victory since he won at Gateway.
We haven't even mentioned Marcus Ericsson was nowhere to be seen and finished 19th. I don't know what went wrong for Andretti Global in the second half of the season. On the surface, it doesn't appear they did anything drastic to cost the team its form.
12. Conor Daly probably should have finished in the top ten as well, but pit stops are Juncos Hollinger Raicng's kryptonite. Daly was in the top five in the early going, then he dropped to the lower part of the top ten after this first pit stop. He didn't have a good final stop when basically the entire field stopped. Daly drove well, but there is a limit of what he can get out of Juncos Hollinger Racing.
I guess I should mentioned Sting Ray Robb was 23rd to cover JHR's entire day. It was a typical Sting Ray Robb performance. Slow. A lap down. At least he didn't get more attention than that.
13. Santino Ferrucci was 14th, and that was a generous result for Ferrucci, which is something we do not say often about him on ovals. Ferrucci wasn't good this weekend. He didn't have the speed, and David Malukas was quicker from the very start of practice. Ferrucci probably should have been 18th, 19th or 20th. He lost a lap. The only reason Ferrucci had a chance to finish this well was IndyCar's wave around rules. If drivers could not make a pit stop after taking the wave around, every oval race would have at least two or three drivers finishing about five to six spots worse than they actually end up.
14. Rinus VeeKay spent a fair amount of this race in the top ten, and VeeKay would have been better that 15th without that final caution. He lost all his ground in the final pit cycle. At the start of the season, I would have felt better about a 15th for VeeKay and Dale Coyne Racing, but they have been competitive across the board, and VeeKay started 11th today. These are a few too many points lost. It could have been worse, but it is ok to be upset that this should have been better.
15. Let's run through the field. Devlin DeFrancesco was 16th in a race where I honestly never noticed him, but that means he did nothing wrong. DeFrancesco was a spot ahead of his teammate Louis Foster, who was the first car to finish one lap down. Foster went the longest on the first pit cycle, but that trapped him a lap down for most of the race. He was actually a two laps down for a good portion.
Graham Rahal had a half spin early in the race, it cost him ground, but he never recovered, finishing two laps down in 24th. I don't know what happened because Rahal qualified tenth. I understand that first stint being difficult because his tires were likely shot after that move. I don't know why Rahal didn't stop for tires after that. My guess is the team didn't want to get caught out if there was a late caution, but either way, Rahal fell like a rock and never looked quick after that incident. It was strange because he sounded hopeful after qualifying.
16. Robert Shwartzman was 18th, so he only lost one point in the rookie of the year battle to Louis Foster. At least we will have that to watch at Nashville. Shwartzman didn't do anything notable today. Good because it meant he didn't wreck. Bad because it meant he was slow.
Callum Ilott lost an engine, which ended his top ten finish streak. That was always going to end today because neither Prema car was particularly quick.
17. Kyffin Simpson was 20th. I don't know which Kyffin Simpson to believe. I think we can acknowledge Simpson got a few breaks to finish fifth in Detroit and third in Toronto, but there have been races where he has legitimately been about tenth, 11th or 12th. But then he has races like this where he wasn't any good. Ovals are definitely something he struggles with.
18. Jacob Abel completed 248 laps and finished 21st. That is about as good as it can get for Abel at the moment.
Felix Rosenqvist never looked quite right after his qualifying accident yesterday. That car was never right. It was slow. Rosenqvist had to suffer to finish 22nd.
19. There were two notable accidents. Will Power got into the wall in turn two attempting to overtake the lapped car of Kyffin Simpson, and that damage led to Power spinning in turn four. Power was in a top five position at the time.
I don't know if Power can do anything to save his job, but throwing away a top five run was likely not the best choice. However, it is another race where something went wrong for a Penske car. At least one of them has been snake-bitten in every race this season.
Nolan Siegel spun exiting turn four on the opening lap and he will be scored with zero laps completed for this race. Siegel gets his fair amount of attention for everything he is not doing. He isn't any better than where he was a year ago when was wrapping up running the final ten races with Arrow McLaren. I am sure it can get better next year, but I would not be surprised if it doesn't in 2026. No glimmer of hope is breaking through.
When you consider how short of a leash some other drivers have gotten with McLaren, it would surprise no one if McLaren showed the Siegel family the door in the offseason and hired a third driver it thought could run with O'Ward and Lundgaard. At the moment, Siegel is not even close to those two.
20. This was another great Milwaukee crowd. I acknowledge that due to the size of the grandstands, and grandstands that were covered with tarps, that was likely about 20,000 people, which is still good, but I think this event has a chance to grow even more. The people have bought in, but I believe IndyCar can get more out of this race. Road America gets more than double this on race day and that is an hour further north.
IndyCar is heading in the right direction with Milwaukee, but the goal for 2026 is for all those covered grandstands in turn one to be open and filled with people.
21. I kind of wish Milwaukee was 50 laps longer and I kind of wish Milwaukee was the season finale. Nashville Superspeedway is 45 minutes outside of Nashville. Let's not act like IndyCar is giving up some grand location if it flipped Nashville to be the penultimate race. Both are drawing about the same size crowd, Milwaukee likely has more potential growth, and we have seen some pretty good racing over two years at Milwaukee. The fans love the fair vibe, and I think IndyCar can take that to the next level. It seems like a fun race just to be at, and if it was the finale, it could be the big party to end the season without having to do much more. All the infrastructure is already there because of the fairgrounds. That is a great foundation to start with and I think a great way for IndyCar to end the season would be with a 300-lap race at a historic venue.
Embrace the history you have, IndyCar! Give this legendary venue its chance to shine. Hell, make the finale 400 laps and go wild! People would love it.
22. I want to end circling back to Christian Rasmussen and his victory.
This is the beauty of IndyCar.
In any race, pretty much any team can pull out a strategy and drive to victory.
Rasmussen wasn't the best driver today, but he was probably one of the five best. When the race was shaken up with an unexpected caution, Rasmussen could take on an alternate strategy and drive to the front and steal a victory. This wasn't all luck. The luck was the caution. Passing all those cars and beating Álex Palou required skill even with fresher tires.
It was Rasmussen today but it could have been Alexander Rossi. It could have been Felix Rosenqvist or Marcus Armstrong with Meyer Shank Racing. It could have been Conor Daly at Juncos Hollinger Racing. It could have been David Malukas or Santino Ferrucci with A.J. Foyt Racing.
When you consider this season we saw Graham Rahal lead the most laps and likely have a great shout for victory at the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, and Felix Rosenqvist was chasing down Palou at Road America, we are looking at a season where the smallest of teams still have a shot when everything clicks on their best day. Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing has been struggling for years, but its best day isn't capped at potentially finishing eighth. It can be on the podium and fighting for a victory. Ed Carpenter Racing has been through its share of troubles, but it has found something where it can be a force on the ovals, and if it falls right it can drive to a win.
We are coming off one of the most dominant seasons we have ever seen for a driver in IndyCar, and yet we can still see a first-time winner for a mid-pack team and it isn't just because of a timely caution or a freak rainstorm.
Yes, I realize both those things happened today, but Rasmussen didn't win because only because of those things. Rasmussen got a shot and could drive to the front. For all the amazing things he has done this season, in a single race he can use his talent to take a car to the front and beat the other 26 cars competing, and driving for Ed Carpenter Racing isn't keeping him from being the best.
Many times this season we have gone into a race thinking we knew what was going to happen and Álex Palou ended up winning like we expected, but IndyCar is still capable of these days, and that is beautiful.
23. Let's see if we can continue this high into the final week of the season. In less than seven days, the checkered flag will wave for the final time at Nashville Superspeedway, and the 2025 NTT IndyCar Series season will be over.
