Musings From the Weekend: This Should Be The Finale

Here is a rundown of what got me thinking...

Kyle Kirkwood thrashed the field on his way to victory in the IndyCar race from Washington, D.C. The Netherlands didn't need to rain help produce a good Dutch Grand Prix, though it could have used it for the sprint race. We did see one of the greater passes of the year at Zandvoort. There were a few notable accidents across the sports car racing world. NASCAR started in the damp in New England. We are approaching the final weekend of August. That means the IndyCar season is almost over. We should consider the venue of the finale. IndyCar's best option could be right under its nose.

This Should Be The Finale

In two years since its return to the IndyCar calendar, Milwaukee has developed into a can't-miss event. Prior to its return in 2024, there was skepticism the one-mile oval would draw a respectable crowd after it struggled to attract and maintain interest a decade earlier. Year one blew everyone away and it continued in year two. Year three sees a return of a doubleheader weekend, providing full Saturday and Sunday for spectators. 

Milwaukee has quickly become a standout event, something IndyCar needs especially for an oval. I said it after last year's race and I will reiterate it now, Milwaukee should be IndyCar's finale. 

It has a crowd. It has an identity. It has outstanding racing. It certainly would feel like a proper setting to conclude the season. IndyCar has struggled for decades to have a worthy season finale. It has gone around the country chasing the proper event and none have stuck. It once ended at Chicagoland and tried Homestead. A Las Vegas attempt was made. It returned to Fontana. It has experimented in Northern California, first at Sonoma and then returning to Laguna Seca, once a proper finale. Nashville got the spot in what was supposed to be a street race, but turned into a respectable oval event. Each has had shortcomings, mostly the lack of a crowd and the feeling of a championship-decider. 

Chicagoland was never going to stick on the first Sunday of the NFL season. Homestead never drew a crowd. Fontana was good and was better in 2013 it closed the season in October, but it lost the spot as the season finale when it was decided to conclude the season by Labor Day. Sonoma never really had great crowds, and Laguna Seca hasn't come close to the finales we saw over 30 years ago. Nashville was good, but it was distant from the downtown location we became accustomed to visiting. 

Milwaukee ticks all the boxes. It is essentially in a downtown location, and it fills the stands. If it was the finale, it could force the removal of some of those sponsorship banners and opening a few more of those grandstands. Most importantly, it has had some dramatic racing in the last two years. The final race would come down to the closing laps, keeping the audience engaged to the very end, which is what you want especially if a championship is on the line. There is also history in the venue, hosting IndyCar races prior to World War II and long being a staple on the schedule even if it was absent for a chunk of the 21st century. 

It might not be the finale IndyCar wants, but it is the finale IndyCar deserves. 

Laguna Seca reclaimed the finale spot this year as Nashville moved to the summer to follow the FIFA World Cup Final, an experiment rain washed out. One of the other pushes for Laguna Seca is certain people desire to be in Monterey. It is a gorgeous part of the country, and for sponsors and dignitaries, it is a good place to spend a weekend. The problem is Laguna Seca doesn't draw 15,000 spectators. The place looks empty even with grandstands that are no larger than many top-tier high school football fields. 

If Laguna Seca was drawing 40,000 people or 50,000 people and looked close to the old days of Bobby Rahal, Michael Andretti and Alex Zanardi, it would be a proper place to finish the season. That isn't the case, and if we were honest, Laguna Seca could be sacrificed for a different venue with a better crowd elsewhere in the country. Pleasing sponsors is part of the game, but IndyCar needs to end with a bang, and Milwaukee is it. 

It isn't the largest crowd, but Milwaukee feels big. Anyone watching at home will see a full grandstand and believe it is an event keeping an eye on. The visuals go further than you think. If the stands are empty, viewers at home will think it is not worth their time and move on. For the finale, IndyCar's final race for six months, it should do all it can to attract an audience before closing the curtain. 

Beyond how it looks on television, Milwaukee has been done correctly the last two years. It has taken advantage of its location on the Wisconsin State Fairgrounds and made the race an extension of the fair atmosphere. People have loved it, and it gives the spectators more beyond what is happening on the track. The sponsors might love the setting of Laguna Seca, but in terms of an event, it is hard to say Milwaukee would not be a good sell. 

After all, don't sponsors want to see a crowd, potential customers, people they can sell to? Even if it is 30,000 people, it is much more than we have at Laguna Seca, and it is contained to a smaller area, making it easier to reach and be seen by those attending. 

For as much as we see IndyCar's midwestern base as a crutch to the series that keeps its from expanding, it is fine that it has that foundation and it is probably the best location for the finale to take place. We aren't lying to ourselves about where a fair number of the fanbase originates. Milwaukee would be accessible to the core audience and the finale would only be greater if it was held in their backyard. 

If you need to wine-and-dine folks, house them an hour up the road at Whistling Straits, the golf resort on the shores of Lake Michigan, and hold the banquet there. It is a little out of the way, but they will all take their helicopters back and forth. They will be fine. They can have their luxurious weekend and the IndyCar fans can have a celebrated race cap off the season while enjoying cream puffs and fried cheese curds. Hell, even the swanky crowd loves fair food. It is a win-win for everyone. 

Milwaukee is already 95% of the way to being a knockout finale location. The final 5% is mostly just making it the last race. 

Winners From the Weekend

You know about Kyle Kirkwood, but did you know...

Lando Norris won the Dutch Grand Prix, his second career victory. George Russell won the sprint race.

Ryan Blaney won the NASCAR Cup race from Loudon, his third victory of the season. Layne Riggs won the Truck race, his sixth victory of the season. 

The #9 Pfaff Motorsports Lamborghini of Andrea Caldarelli and Sandy Mitchell won the IMSA race from Virginia International Raceway. The #57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG of Russell Ward and Philip Ellis won in GTD. 

The #43 Inter Europol Competition Oreca-Gibson of Jakub Śmechowski, Tom Dillmann and Nick Yelloly won the 4 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps. The #5 Rinaldi Racing of José Cautela, Mikkel Gaarde Pedersen and Alvise Rodella won in Ligier-Toyota won in LMP3. The #86 GR Racing Ferrari of Michael Wainwright, Lorcan Hanafin, and Mex Jansen won in LMGT3.

The #16 ARTA Mugen Honda of Tomoki Nojiri and Ren Sato won the Super GT race from Suzuka. The #9 Pacific Racing Team BMW of Yusuke Tomibayashi and Yuta Fujiwara won in GT300.

Brodie Kostecki, Will Brown and Broc Feeney split the Supercars races from Queensland Raceway.

Coming Up This Weekend

IndyCar has its doubleheader in Milwaukee. 

GT World Challenge America will be up the road at Road America. It feels like an unnecessary clash. 

GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup has its penultimate round at the Nürburgring. Another unnecessary clash within sanctioning body.

NASCAR concludes its regular season for its top two national series at Daytona.

MotoGP will be in Aragón. 

The World Rally Championship is back in Paraguay.

First Impressions: Washington, D.C. 2026

1. It could not have been more of a dominant drive for Kyle Kirkwood on his way to victory in the Grand Prix of Washington, D.C. Starting on the front row with Álex Palou to his inside, Kirkwood had a challenge from the start, and it only took two corners for Kirkwood to take the lead. That didn't mean a thing though. Plenty of opening stints have seen Palou settle in second and take the lead through the first pit cycle. A caution did not allow for the pit cycle to play out with green flag pit stops, and Palou clipped a tire laid out in Mick Schumacher's pit box, taking Palou out of the equation. 

That may have made it a little easier for Kirkwood, but he still drove to the lead ahead of cars running an alternate strategy. With separation, Kirkwood flew, opening a lead over ten seconds in no time, and it was never really closer than that. Even with the late cautions toward the end of the race, bringing the rest of the field to Kirkwood's gearbox, and a late attempt from Scott McLaughlin to take the lead, Kirkwood kept firm control of this race. In the closing laps, he was running his fastest laps of the race, and he still won by over three seconds ahead of Christian Lundgaard.

Kirkwood's street course prowess has been well-documented. His sixth street course victory in seven career victories speak for themselves. He never slipped up on a course where it was uncertain you could fully be in control. With the bumps and uneven surface, it was a track setup to catch out drivers. Plenty of drivers had little bobbles that would seem to be innocuous turn out to be tumultuous. There was no sense of safety on any lap. Last week, Kirkwood clipped a barrier and ended his race in Markham while pushing for a podium finish. If anyone knew a course could trip a driver when least expected, it was Kirkwood. 

He remained out of the barriers and he remained near-flawless to the checkered flag. With Palou's struggles today, Kirkwood kept his championship hopes alive for another race. It is still a 91-point deficit with three races remaining.

2. Christian Lundgaard had good pace in this race, and it looked like he would be racing for second with Scott McLaughlin until the late cautions packed the field together. Then McLaughlin threw it away on the penultimate restart in turn one. It opened the door for Lundgaard to push Kirkwood, and he kept Kirkwood honest, but Lundgaard did not have it in the closing laps.

For as good as Kirkwood has been on street courses this season, Lundgaard has been just as good. He looked strong today and was deserving of a podium finish. 

3. Three races, three consecutive third-place finishes for Will Power, and Power had a lot of pace in this race. Like Markham, Power had speed despite starting further down the order than desired. In the penultimate stint, Power chased down McLaughlin and Lundgaard and put himself firmly in the fight for the podium. He may have gotten there without McLaughlin's issues. The second half of the season has been much kinder to Power. He feels like he has settled in at Andretti Global.

4. Marcus Ericsson had another strong race, and Ericsson took a six-spot grid penalty for an engine change this morning. He went from 21st to fifth. Ericsson was shuffled a little too far back to really push for the podium. Even though the field was bunched up with the late cautions, Ericsson still finished over 12 seconds behind Kirkwood. That shows how much of a different realm Kirkwood was in today compare to a teammate that also finished in the top five

5. Kyffin Simpson went off-strategy early to attempt a four-stop race. It looked like a stretch, but the cautions fell in Simpson's favor that he could be on the same cycle as the leaders, and it turned into a strategy that put Simpson into a top five position. Two fewer cautions and Simpson likely does not get this result. Credit to Simpson for holding on and the #8 Ganassi team for rolling these dice. Simpson has been finding a way to get results in the second half of the season

6. Nolan Siegel also went on the four-stop strategy like Simpson and it got Siegel a career-best finish in sixth. Siegel drove well today. He didn't make any mistakes. He didn't overdrive the car. He held his own and kept it in a top ten position. This could have been a gamble that didn't pay off, but Siegel brought it home.

7. Scott Dixon got off the snide with a seventh place finish, but Dixon needed those late cautions. His final stop came 41 laps to the checkered flag. It would have been a mighty ask to make it if the race ran entirely green. Those late cautions helped Dixon get to the line, but Dixon also made a late move to take seventh from Josef Newgarden. Dixon was never really a factor in this one, but he just needed a good day. He got it.

8. Josef Newgarden is the top Team Penske finisher, and Newgarden probably did the least of the three today. Newgarden never made a push for the front. He ran in the middle of the field all race and was in position for a top ten result. He made a few passes, but he was not breathtakingly quick today. Eighth is a good day though.

9. For the first time in his IndyCar career, Caio Collet has finished in the top ten. Collet was ninth. He didn't really make any waves. He completed 147 laps, didn't make a mistake and he was rewarded for it. He needed this day because his season has been rotten, and it sounds like Collet is under pressure to remain at A.J. Foyt Racing. This will go a long way.

10. Romain Grosjean was on the same strategy as Simpson, but an off-track excursion in turn one cost him dearly. Grosjean nearly gave away a top ten finish with that incident, but he recovered to take tenth. It definitely could have been a little better. With how his season was going, consecutive top ten finishes is tremendous for this group.

11. Mick Schumacher took 11th. The biggest thing for Schumacher was not making a mistake. Last week, a barrier caught him out. Today, he ran all 147 laps and he was the best Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing finisher. That is beneficial to him and this team. 

12. Alexander Rossi was 12th. I don't know what else to say. Ed Carpenter Racing had good pace in practice. It didn't translate for Rossi in qualifying. It did for Christian Rasmussen, and Rasmussen started fourth. Come the race, we didn't see anything special. It is better than it has been for Rossi, but it is still disappointing considering how the weekend started. We hear a lot about promise from ECR but we seldom see it fulfilled.

13. Graham Rahal went well off strategy early in the race, but unlike others, it didn't cycle into Rahal's favor. He was always caught in needing to make an extra pit stop. In a way, 13th is pretty good because it looked like Rahal might have had to make a stop and end up a lap down. It is hard to count it as a moral victory, but it could have been much worse.

14. We are going to blow through the lapped cars here...

Christian Rasmussen was spun in turn five after contact from Marcus Armstrong. Both cars were competing for top ten positions at that point. Rasmussen cannot catch a break. He was fortunate the race shook out where he could finish 14th, the best of the lapped finishers. It looked like it was going to be worse than that for a great portion of this race. Rasmussen had good pace today. It is a shame he was taken out so early.

Dennis Hauger was 15th a lap down. This was another race where Hauger didn't do anything with a good starting position. He started eighth today. At no point was he moving forward. He dropped back again. This has happened too often this season for Hauger.

Patricio O'Ward cost himself a top ten finish with a bad run into turn six and going into the runoff. The bumps knocked O'Ward out of rhythm and he wasn't going to make the corner. It was surprising we didn't see more of these incidents during the race. There were plenty of those during practice and qualifying. For O'Ward, it was incredibly costly. 

Marcus Armstrong had a penalty for that contact with Rasmussen. Armstrong is in a horrendous funk. He looks like a driver who cannot get out of his own way. Everything has been a downslide since his engine failure while leading at Road America. 

Louis Foster was banged up in the Markham accident. Thumb injury, foot injury, Foster was not 100% in this race and it showed. He was never competitive in this race.

Felix Rosenqvist spun in turn one right after Scott McLaughlin smacked the barrier. The two incidents were unrelated. Rosenqvist grazed the barrier and could continue, but the damage was enough to drop him a lap down and ruin what should have been a top ten run. 

15. And now we reach Álex Palou. The first 35 laps looked good. Then Palou clipped the tire in Schumacher's pit box. It did look like that tire was in an odd spot, more centered than usual, but Palou is supposed to avoid it. That was a drive-through penalty. 

On the next pit stop, Palou's crew could not get the left front tire secure and that cost him time and put him a lap down. Palou had a chance with that stop to remain on the lead lap and be ahead on pit stops compared to Kirkwood. It would have positioned Palou to cycle to the front should a caution come out before the rest of the leaders made their next stops. Of course, the fumbled wheel nut negated that and the caution never came anyway. 

Palou ran aggressive to remain competitive, and he was going to take an extra pit stop in this effort, but he suffered left rear suspension failure and spun, effectively any hope of a promising result. The repairs were made and he ended up 20th, three laps down. 

The championship is still over. The reaction has been just like after Toronto last year. 

"It's not over." 

Does anyone think Palou is going to lose 30 points in each of the next three races? Seriously? 

"He lost 42 points today." 

Do you really think that is going to happen again? Palou is 17 points away from clinching the title with two races to spare. He would need to lose 37 points over the two Milwaukee races for the title not to be clinched early, and he really needs to lose 42 points because any championship margin of 49 points or greater means all Palou must do at Laguna Seca is start to claim the championship. 

Yeah, Palou cough up some points today. Yeah, these were unforced errors. They aren't going to happen in four consecutive races to close the season. All Palou needs is one average day in the final three races to lock up the title. That is going to happen. Mathematically, it is still alive. Unless a driver is within 49 points after Milwaukee, let's not kid ourselves into thinking we are in for a title fight to very last checkered flag of the season.

The inevitable has been delayed unless at least Saturday.

16. Electrical issues effectively ended Santino Ferrucci's race immediately. Ferrucci was on pit lane early and had to change his steering wheel. Ferrucci was basically seven laps down for this entire race, and once he couldn't gain anymore positions, he pulled it in 19 laps from the finish. That was a tough break.

17. Four retirements in this race, which feels surprisingly low. 

Scott McLaughlin went for it on Kyle Kirkwood on the penultimate restart. Kirkwood had been untouchable to that point. McLaughlin had a slight fuel advantage and the alternate tire. It was a golden opportunity to take the lead. McLaughlin overcooked it in the corner. It is a tough blow. This was probably one of McLaughlin's best races of the season, and all he will have to show for it is 22nd. 

18. Rinus VeeKay was ricocheted into the barrier after Armstrong hit Rasmussen into the Dane. There wasn't much Rasmussen could have done there, and it was devastating for VeeKay, who was actually ahead of Kirkwood on that restart because VeeKay was on pit lane when the first caution came out for David Malukas getting into the wall and collecting Sting Ray Robb as collateral damage.

VeeKay appeared to have a run on Graham Rahal, who led on that restart, but VeeKay admitted he confused where the restart line was, and he backed off. I don't know if he thought where they initially started the race on the exit of turn one was where the restart was supposed to be and not the start/finish line. VeeKay was alongside Rahal, and then he backed off and it allowed Kirkwood, Simpson and Grosjean to get ahead. Not long after that, VeeKay was pinballed into the barrier and out of the race.

The strange thing is this was the third restart of the race. VeeKay would have known that restarts were at start/finish, unless he thought it was on exit of turn one and everyone had to throttle up out of turn seven to have enough speed on the restarts exiting turn one. On the first two restarts, there were no real pass attempts into turn one. It is conceivable VeeKay got it mixed up. That confusion may have been costly to the Dutchman.

19. David Malukas appeared to have clipped the barrier on the inside of turn seven, sending Malukas into the outside barrier. Sting Ray Robb had nowhere to go as Malukas was parked on corner exit. Malukas had gone off-strategy, stopping under the second caution for debris. He had been running seventh. 

I don't know how that strategy would have played out. It became clear through practice this was going to be a three-stop race as soon as any caution came out. We had a caution immediately for debris, which lasted three laps, and then on lap 18 the caution came out again for debris, which lasted four laps. At that point, it was obvious this was going to be a three-stop race. Malukas was on the same strategy Rahal employed, and Rahal had to make three more stops to make the finish. Rahal made a fourth additional stop to get tires with just over 20 laps to go after Palou's spin. 

I think Malukas is finishing at best in 12th or 13th if he went the full distance. It was a roll of the dice that didn't quite make sense, especially for a car racing in the top ten. 

Malukas was hard on himself after the accident, as this was his third consecutive result outside the top ten. He brushed the barrier at Markham, and today's accident was an unforced error. The team didn't quite have the pace at Portland. I don't think Malukas has been terribly poor. It is a bit of a rut, but not the end of the world. 

20. As mentioned above, Sting Ray Robb had nowhere to go when Malukas spun. I don't know how well Robb would have done without that accident. He probably finishes at least 20th. 

21. I thought it was a good race. The track was fine. The opening stanza was rather uneventful. Minus the debris cautions, it was processional early. 

Most of this race was settled. The most action came involving lapped traffic, and with a race that was 250 miles in length, it allowed lapped traffic to be a factor. Most street races are complete around 175 miles, if we even go that far, and we might not see the very end of the pack become a factor. We never see the end of the field caught with nearly 60 laps to go. Arlington was barely over 60 laps in length. 

The roads were wide enough that it didn't feel like every pass was risky. It allowed drivers to make a move early and position themselves properly into a corner. I don't think it was the greatest street course IndyCar has ever raced. I don't think it was the worst either. It can be somewhere in the middle.

Extending the race to 147 laps might have cost us a little more thrilling race because this became a race where everyone knew it was achievable completing it in three pit stops. If this race remained 125 laps, as originally scheduled, it would have been a three-stop race for everyone and there would have been almost no shot at running it in two stops. The teams were barely making it 40 laps. Even at 125 laps, if a team made it 40 laps, they would still need to make three pit stops. 

We could have had a full-throttle, three-stopper at 125 laps because the pit windows would have been massive. Teams could have tried to stretch each stint to 35 or 36 laps and then had a shorter final stint to sprint to the finish, or teams could have stopped early, around lap 21 or 22 and run an alternate strategy from there. 

The longer street race was different to see. We have seen a road or street course race of this length in over 40 years. I don't know if we need to do it again or if this was necessary. If there is going to be a three-stop race, set it up so everyone has to push and make it so attempting to stretch fuel is disadvantageous. There should be a goal for the race length. 

22. It is getting late early. Only two race weekend remain. There are three races thanks to the Milwaukee doubleheader. I consider that a blessing. We are back on track Saturday, Friday technically because of practice, but we are talking races here. 

Morning Warm-Up: Washington, D.C. 2026

Álex Palou won pole position for the Grand Prix of Washington, D.C. with a lap of 56.8993 seconds in the final round of qualifying on Saturday evening. It is Palou's seventh pole position of the season and the 19th of his career. There is a chance Palou could clinch the championship this weekend. If he leaves Washington, D.C. with at least a 162-point lead over second, Palou will clinch his fourth consecutive championship and the fifth of his career. Palou enters this race with five consecutive top five finishes, his longest streak since the five-race span that covered the final four races of last season and the St. Petersburg season opener in March. He has won ten times from pole position in his career, including at Detroit in June.

Kyle Kirkwood was 0.5668 seconds off Palou's pole-winning lap as Kirkwood was the first car to take to the track in the final round of qualifying, directly ahead of Palou. This is only the second time this season Kirkwood has started on the front row this year. He started first at Nashville. The only other time he has started second for a race was Toronto in 2024, a race he finished second to his Andretti Autosport teammate Colton Herta. Twenty-first at Markham was Kirkwood's worst street course result since he was 24th at Belle Isle in 2022, driving for A.J. Foyt Racing with a fractured wrist. He had 13 consecutive top ten finishes on street courses prior to last week.

Scott McLaughlin put the #3 Chevrolet into this on the grid, 0.7207 seconds off Palou's best lap. It is the third time in four races McLaughlin will start third, and it is his fourth time starting third this season. He has finished worse than third in each of those starts. Prior to this season, McLaughlin had never started third in his IndyCar career. McLaughlin makes his 100th career start this weekend. Six drivers have had won in their 100th career start, five of those occurred in the month of August. The only one that didn't occurred last year when Patricio O'Ward won at Iowa.

Christian Rasmussen has his best career starting position in fourth. For the second time in his career, Rasmussen is starting in the top five. He started fifth at Mid-Ohio last month. This is the fifth time this season Rasmussen has started in the top ten. Prior to 2026, he had three top ten starts in 31 races. This is the final street course race of the season. Rasmussen has finished outside the top twenty in the last three races and in eight of 14 races this season.

Marcus Armstrong will be start fifth after having started 20th or worse in three of the last four races. Entering Washington, D.C., Armstrong has failed to finish on the lead lap in consecutive three races, the longest slump in his career. The New Zealander has finished outside the top ten in four of five street races. Twice has he finished 11th. His best street course finish was tenth at Arlington. This will be Armstrong's 61st career start. Seventeen drivers took 61 starts or more to score their first career victory.

Slight contact with the barrier on his final qualifying run saw David Malukas settle for sixth on the grid as he cruised around on his final round qualifying lap. This was his third time making the final round of qualifying on a street course this season. Malukas is hoping to avoid three consecutive results out the top ten since the first five races of last season. He has finished outside the top ten in three of the first five street races. This will be Malukas' 76th career start. Ten drivers took 76 starts or more to score their first career victory.

Patricio O'Ward fell 0.1151 seconds shy of making the final round of qualifying, and this will place O'Ward seventh on the grid. This does snap a three-race skid of starting outside the top ten. This is the 15th race of the season. O'Ward has finished in the top five in the 15th race of the season five times in six seasons. The lone exception was last year when he was 25th at Portland. His third career victory came from seventh starting position at Iowa in 2022.

Dennis Hauger starts in the top ten for the third consecutive race. This time, Hauger is rolling off from eighth position. Though it has been eight races since his most recent top ten finish, Hauger has finished in the top fifteen in the last two races. He had finished 20th or worse in the four races prior to that. The most recent road/street course won from the eighth starting position was the 2025 St. Petersburg race, and Álex Palou was the winner.

Christian Lundgaard will start directly behind his Arrow McLaren teammate O'Ward in ninth position. Lundgaard has never had multiple podium finishes on street courses in a season. He was third in the St. Petersburg season opener. The Dane has six top ten finishes in the last seven races. Lundgaard is one of two drivers who enter Washington, D.C. having completed all 1,815 laps this season. The other is his teammate O'Ward.

Felix Rosenqvist rounds out the top ten on the grid. This is the first time Rosenqvist has started between sixth and tenth since last year's Nashville season finale when he rolled off from ninth. Fuel pressure issues ended Rosenqvist's Markham race after 18 laps, classifying him in 24th. He has not had consecutive finishes outside the top twenty since 2024 when he was 26th at Iowa and then 23rd at Toronto.

Caio Collet made it out of the first round of qualifying for the third time this season, and he will start 11th for the second time this season. Collet started and finished 11th at Mid-Ohio. Collet has failed to finish on the lead lap in the last three races with two of those being retirements. This is the first time Collet has been the top A.J. Foyt Racing starter since that Mid-Ohio race.

Nolan Siegel starts in the top twelve for only the third time this season. Siegel previously started ninth at Phoenix and seventh at Road America. This is only the second time Siegel made the second round of qualifying on a street course. The other was Long Beach last season. In three of the last four races, Siegel has finished in the top 12. He had only three finishes in the top 12 in the first ten races of the season. (Update 8:08 a.m. ET - Siegel will take a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change and start 18th).

Will Power missed out on the second round of qualifying by 0.0632 second, and Power will start 13th. The Australian did slap the barrier late in his qualifying group. Power has finished third in the last two races. It is the first time he has had consecutive third-place finishes since the 2018 season finale at Sonoma and the 2019 season opener at St. Petersburg. The last time he had three consecutive finishes in the same position was in 2022 when he was fourth at Texas, Long Beach and Barber Motorsports Park.

Scott Dixon was on a lap good enough to advance to round two, but a red flag came out when Dixon was two corners away from the finish line. Instead, he will start to Power's outside on row seven. Dixon was 0.1438 seconds off advancing. Washington, D.C. is the 57th different circuit Dixon has competed on in his career. He has won on 28 of those circuits, the most all-time in IndyCar history.

Marcus Ericsson also brushed the barrier in the first round of qualifying, and Ericsson will start 15th. After each of Ericsson's first four career victories, he finished ninth, ninth, seventh and eighth. Only twice in his career has he had consecutive top five finishes, in 2021 at Mid-Ohio and Nashville and in 2022 at the Grand Prix of Indianapolis and the Indianapolis 500. (Update 8:08 a.m. ET - Ericsson will take a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change and start 21st).

Josef Newgarden finds himself on the outside of row eight. This is the third consecutive race Newgarden is starting outside the top ten, and he has started outside the top ten on all six street course races this season. Newgarden has finished 25th or worse in the 15th race of the season the last three years. He had seven consecutive top ten finishes in the 15th race of the season prior to that with two victories, both coming at Gateway. 

Alexander Rossi takes 17th on the grid, the fifth time in the last six races Rossi will start outside the top ten. After suffering a gearbox failure at Markham, it was the second time this season he has gone four consecutive races without a top fifteen finish. Four retirements is tied for his most in a season. Rossi retired from four of 14 races in 2020.

Louis Foster goes from starting on pole position last week to Markham to 18th on the grid for Washington, D.C., however, the top Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing driver on the grid in both instances. This is the 12th time Foster has started outside the top ten this season. Only once in Foster's career has he retired from consecutive races. That was last year at Detroit and Gateway, two races where he was in accidents.

Rinus VeeKay hit the barrier early in the first round of qualifying, and VeeKay takes 19th on the grid after only being able to complete three laps in the session. With finishes of fourth and seventh in the last two races, VeeKay is attempting to get his third consecutive top ten finish. He has had at least one run of three consecutive top ten finishes in four of his first six seasons in IndyCar.

Mick Schumacher rounds out the top twenty on the grid. Schumacher has finished outside the top twenty in four of five street course races this season. His best street course finish was 17th at Long Beach, a race where he started 21st. His accident at Markham was only Schumacher's second retirement of the season. The other was St. Petersburg, where he was caught in an opening lap incident. (Update 8:08 a.m. ET - Schumacher will take a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change and start 24th).

Romain Grosjean occupies 21st on the grid. This is the fifth time this season Grosjean has started outside the top twenty. Grosjean picked up his sixth career runner-up finish at Markham last week. He is now tied with Geoff Brabham with most second-place finishes without a victory. Only Vitor Meira has more with eight runner-up results but no victories.

Graham Rahal was the slowest driver in the first qualifying group and this places Rahal in 22nd starting spot, the fourth time Rahal has started outside the top twenty this season. He has not finished better than 18th when starting outside the top twenty in 2026. In the first eight races, Rahal had three podium finishes and five top ten finishes. His ninth at Markham was his first top ten finish in the last six races.

Sting Ray Robb slides into the 23rd grid position. It is the tenth time this season Robb is starting outside the top twenty. In 66 career races, this is the 53rd time he has started 21st or worse. Robb has finished in the top fifteen in the last two street course races, 14th at Detroit and 11th at Markham.

Kyffin Simpson was set to advance from the second group in round one, but Simpson clipped the barrier on the outside of turn six, bringing out a red flag and deleting Simpson's two best laps. He will start 24th. Simpson has finished on the lead lap in nine consecutive street course races. This is his worst starting position of the season.

A six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change drops Santino Ferrucci to 25th. Ferrucci was going to line up 22nd prior to the penalty. Last week, Ferrucci was tenth at Markham. He has not had top ten finishes in consecutive street course races since he went sixth and tenth at the 2021 Belle Isle doubleheader while driving for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.

Fox's coverage of the Grand Prix of Washington, D.C. begins at 11:30 a.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 1:22 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 147 laps.

Third Impressions: Markham 2026

1. It has been a week since the embarrassing opening day to the IndyCar weekend at Markham where no on-track session occurred due to construction delays. For an inaugural event where it felt imperative it came off as a success, day one was an abject failure that made the following two days nearly irrelevant. 

Somehow, it turned around and Saturday and Sunday exceeded all expectations of positivity. 

The final two days do not entirely cancel out Friday. 

Markham was a first-time event, but with an experienced promoter in Green Savoree Racing Promotions it should have been better aware of the shortcomings leading into the weekend. 

Any street course is a challenge to put together, and there will always be some last-minute work that must be done because of the nature of closing down a part of a city and keeping it open to the local traffic until the last possible moment. Even beyond the time needed for course set up, another issue that arose was a lack of tire barriers to properly place around the course, and that also led to the complete abandonment of Friday's schedule. 

Green Savoree had been the promoter for the Toronto race. It was not unaware of what it took to put together a street course in Ontario. It sounds crazy to say, but perhaps it was caught out because the Markham course was 2.1 miles in length and Toronto was 1.786 miles in length. You would think it would have accounted for the increased track length and additional braking zones. Markham had five hard braking zones and Toronto layout around Exhibition Place had three. 

It could have been a case of everything was underestimated off of Toronto's numbers when the Markham course was different enough that it warranted more infrastructure and safety equipment. It doesn't sound great, and it doesn't make it any better. Everyone knows for next year what is necessary to have the track ready in time for the first session.

2. I have been around a while. This hasn't been the first opening day street course issue. From train tracks at San Jose and Baltimore to surface issues in São Paulo to unbearable bumps in Houston, we have seen significantly disrupted opening days before, and Fridays where we wondered how in the world a race would take place on Sunday. 

Some callouses have developed from over the years. Markham was disappointing, but I am getting too old to be angry about it. Disappointment is much worse than anger anyway. 

3. Friday has traditionally been a free day to spectators at the Toronto race and that tradition continued in Markham. Some were saying it was to no loss of the spectators because attending did not cost anything. That might be true for admission but it is not entirely free. People took off from work. They traveled and had to pay for gas or parking or both. Some may have come from a great distance and paid for flights and hotels. They bought concessions, merchandise, etc. And they did all of it to see nothing take place on track because the organizers were not ready. 

The people might not have bought tickets, but they paid with their time and their time was wasted. For people who were curious observers that planned to sample Friday with maybe an inkling of attending the rest of the weekend, they were met with nothing. 

Imagine if you had new neighbors and they invited you over for a party to welcome the rest of the people who lived on the street, and you showed up and they still had 50% of their boxes unpacked and stacked in the living room and dining room, and they didn't have the grill ready nor snacks available and there were no towels in the bathroom... how would you feel about going back to said neighbor's house for future events? 

You only get one chance at a first impression. That certainly was not welcoming or professional by any sense, and some were probably turned off from spending money to go back for the rest of the weekend, and they may have been turned off from ever going again. That is a loss that will never be made up.

4. Where does blame lie? We know it is on the promoter, Green Savoree Racing Productions. IndyCar made it pretty clear in its statement at the end of Friday how upset it was with the organizers. 

Is IndyCar faultless? Mostly.

IndyCar signed off on this event with Green Savoree promoting it. It puts its trust the race weekend would be ready to go at a scheduled time, and it wasn't. Could IndyCar have done more to check on course construction and how things were looking before the event? Maybe, but IndyCar could not have done much more in terms of course construction. It wasn't organizing this race. The series already puts on a fair number of its own races. This was a third-party handling the planning.

Even if it wasn't the series' responsibility, it still didn't look good that the track was not ready. The common person has no idea Green Savoree is putting on the event. It is an IndyCar event. If IndyCar or any of the series are not running, it looks bad on IndyCar, even if that is not a fair place to direct the blame. 

5. Everyone is looking for someone's head on a platter after this and calls of punishment or terminating any partnership with Green Savoree is rather foolish. Green Savoree promotes St. Petersburg and Portland, and it owns Mid-Ohio and promotes that race as well. It has been promoting a quarter of the IndyCar schedule for basically a decade. Markham wasn't great, but it is not enough to end all relationships. 

For starters, IndyCar would be much worse without Green Savoree. No circuits are lining up to host IndyCar races. Killing four events would be suicide for the series. 

St. Petersburg is an outstanding event. Those renovations may have yet to come to Mid-Ohio as Green Savoree had suggested would happen when it purchased the facility nearly 15 years ago, but that race has strengthened during its ownership of the track. Portland does well for one of the more remote races on the IndyCar calendar, and a facility that the city owns. 

It wasn't acceptable what occurred at Markham, but the track record is long enough to know this group will do better next year. If we get a repeat of 2026 in 2027, then we will have a further discussion. 

6. Even for all the issues, the Markham circuit was great, Saturday and Sunday were excellent, and it is hard not to be excited about year two. It certainly did not seem like the events of Friday kept people away. Sunday looked phenomenal. The hope is the race we saw will keep the people coming back and bring more people out. 

Are there a few areas that could be improved? 

The turn five hairpin was not supposed to be designed like that, and while it was an active area of the track, it could be made more into a loop or a hairpin with less of a radius and still be a good passing zone. Turn ten was described as diabolical and could probably be tweak. The first few corners were a little tighter than expected and could be massaged out for next year. 

And I think we are all in agreement it would be best to invest in curved barriers for the inside of the corners so we don't lose three or four cars for slightly clipping concrete. 

7. We have probably a little less than a year until the next Markham race. Nobody should forget how terrible Friday was, and the goal will be to prevent it from happening again. While stressing the lowest moment of the weekend, it should not completely overshadow the highest moment of the weekend, and as a street course, it was a tremendous layout that produced good racing and despite a number of cautions and a choppy middle of the race, we had a terrific finish that kept people on edge until the final laps. 

That is all you can hope for in any race. Markham produced it in year one. 

Let's Look at the League - August 2026

We are into the final month of the IndyCar season, and it is the final days of the regular season in the fictional head-to-head league format. We are on the midst of clinching playoff spots while determining who will be fighting to stay up and who could be going down for next season.

League One

Washington, D.C. marks the final weekend of the regular season. For a number of teams, a spot has already been secured in the playoffs, a few teams are out of the mix, and in some instances everything is still to play for.

The top four from each conference will make the playoffs. Fifth will remain in League One for 2027. Sixth and seventh in each conference will participate in the relegation playoff. Eighth will be relegated for next season.

Results

	Conference #1	Conference #2
Week #11 (Mid-Ohio)	#10 CGR def. #12 Penske (5-8)	#5 McLaren def. #3 Penske (7-24)
	#27 Andretti def. #2 Penske (3-9)	#4 Foyt def. #9 CGR (11-17)
	#7 McLaren def. #21 ECR (2-7)	#60 MSR def. #18 Coyne (13-23)
	#26 Andretti def. #6 McLaren (6-10)	#66 MSR def. #14 Foyt (14-19)
Week #12 (Nashville)	#10 CGR def. #26 Andretti (1-20)	#5 McLaren def. #66 MSR (7-24)
	#27 Andretti def. #7 McLaren (10-16)	#60 MSR def. #9 CGR (5-18)
	#12 Penske def. #6 McLaren (3-11)	#3 Penske def. #14 Foyt (4-13)
	#2 Penske def. #21 ECR (2-22)	#18 Coyne def. #4 Foyt (14-25)
Week #13 (Portland)	#10 CGR def. #2 Penske (1-9)	#60 MSR def. #5 McLaren (2-11)
	#26 Andretti def. #27 Andretti (3-5)	#9 CGR def. #66 MSR (14-25)
	#12 Penske def. #21 ECR (12-24)	#3 Penske def. #18 Coyne (17-19)
	#2 Penske def. #6 McLaren (8-18)	#4 Foyt def. #14 Foyt (20-21)
Week #14 (Markham)	#10 CGR def. #27 Andretti (4-21)	#5 McLaren def. #9 CGR (5-18)
	#26 Andretti def. #7 McLaren (3-6)	#66 MSR def. #60 MSR (16-24)
	#2 Penske def. #12 Penske (13-17)	#3 Penske def. #4 Foyt (8-19)
	#6 McLaren def. #21 ECR (12-23)	#18 Coyne def. #14 Foyt (2-10)

Conference One Standings

#10 Ganassi 11-3

#27 Andretti 10-4

#12 Penske 10-4

#7 McLaren 8-6

#2 Penske 7-7

#26 Andretti 6-8

#6 McLaren 2-12

#21 ECR 2-12

We know the playoff spots in Conference #1, and we are worried about the seeding. While the #7 McLaren and the #2 Penske could finish tied at 8-7, the #7 McLaren is 2-0 head-to-head over the #2 Penske this season with victories at St. Petersburg and Detroit. No matter what, the #7 McLaren will be the #4-seed in the quarterfinals of the playoffs. 

The #10 Ganassi entry has locked up the #1-seed. While either or both the #27 Andretti and #12 Penske could finish level with the #10 Ganassi, the #10 Ganassi is 4-0 against those two entries.

The #27 Andretti and #12 Penske split their head-to-head meetings, and the #27 Andretti holds the #2-seed based on its championship position, second over the #12 Penske's third. What are the odds that the top four teams in the championship ended up in the same conference, and they are all position in their exact championship positions, one to four in conference? 

While it appears the #2 Penske could be fighting to hold onto fifth and avoid the relegation playoff, it has already been clinched security to League One in 2027. The #2 Penske is 2-0 against the #26 Andretti with victories at Phoenix and Gateway. Those were not only head-to-head victories. Josef Newgarden won those races outright. 

We know the #26 Andretti will be in the relegation playoff, and the automatic relegation spot is still undecided. The #6 McLaren moved out of the drop zone after it defeated the #21 ECR entry at Markham. Both of the #6 McLaren's victories have been against the #21 ECR entry. The other victory was the Indianapolis 500.

It is simple. If the #6 McLaren wins, it remains up, barring the #21 ECR doesn't overcome the 31-point deficit in the championship.

Conference Two Standings

#5 McLaren 12-2

#3 Penske 11-3

#60 Meyer Shank 9-5

#66 Meyer Shank 7-7

#18 Coyne 6-8

#9 Ganassi 6-8

#14 Foyt 3-11

#4 Foyt 2-12

The #1-seed is still on the line in Conference #2. The #5 McLaren and the #3 Penske entries have a game between them, but they split their head-to-head meetings. There are 40 points between the #5 McLaren and the #3 Penske. Even if the #5 McLaren loses its head-to-head matchup at Washington, D.C., it will likely hold onto the #1-seed but there is slim chance it could flip. 

We know the #60 MSR entry will be locked into the #3-seed for Conference Two. The final playoff spot, the safe spot for remaining in League One next year and one of the relegation playoff spots are all up for grabs between three teams. 

The #66 MSR entry holds onto fourth at the moment... however, the #66 MSR entry lost both its matchups with the #9 CGR entry and the #18 Coyne entry. However! The #18 Coyne entry went 2-0 against the #9 CGR entry, defeating it at St. Petersburg and Detroit. 

If there is a three-way tie with the #66 MSR losing at Washington, D.C. and both the #9 CGR and #18 Coyne entries winning, the #18 Coyne will make the playoffs, the #9 CGR will take fifth and the #66 MSR entry will be in the relegation playoff. 

Relegation is decided. Though the #14 Foyt entry is only one game ahead of the #4 Foyt entry and they can end the season tied on record, and the #14 Foyt entry is 67 points ahead of the #4 Foyt, an insurmountable amount in one race. Even if they finished tied, the #14 Foyt entry cannot be surpassed in the championship.

For Week 15, we have League One inter-conference matchups for the first time since we began doing this exercise, and these matchups are set via where each team was seeded at the start of the season. The top entry from each conference was paired together with second paired second, third paired with third, and so on all the way down to the eighth-seeded teams facing one another. 

Week 15 Matchups

#10 CGR vs. #5 McLaren

#27 Andretti vs. #9 CGR

#7 McLaren vs. #60 MSR

#26 Andretti vs. #66 MSR

#12 Penske vs. #3 Penske

#2 Penske vs. #4 Foyt

#21 ECR vs. #18 Coyne

#6 McLaren vs. #14 Foyt

Going down the fixture list in the final week we have...

Essentially a dead rubber between the top teams from each conference, foreshadowing a potential championship matchup...

Two teams meeting with one wanting to win to lock up second and the other needing a win to make the playoffs or at least take fifth and secure a place in League One for 2027...

A dead-rubber with the #7 McLaren locked into fourth and the #60 MSR locked into third in their respective conferences...

A matchup where one team has nothing to race for and the other must win to clinch a playoff spot...

One Penske car racing for seeding against another Penske car that could improve its seeding but would need significant help to do so and is essentially locked into second, and this could be a quarterfinal matchup in the playoffs.

A dead-rubber with the #2 Penske locked into fifth and the #4 Foyt locked into eighth and relegated. 

One team looking to avoid relegation versus a team that could be in the playoffs but could also wind up in the relegation playoff. 

A matchup with one entry needing a win to at least clinch a relegation playoff spot versus a car that will definitely be in the relegation playoff.

Tentative Quarterfinal Matchups

#10 CGR vs. #66 MSR

#3 Penske vs. #12 Penske

#27 Andretti vs. #60 MSR

#5 McLaren vs. #7 McLaren

League Two

This is a double-round robin, meaning all nine entries will face each other twice. The top three teams will be promoted.

Week #11 (Mid-Ohio)	#20 ECR def.  #47 RLLR (20-24)
	#8 Ganassi def. #28 Andretti (15-21)
	#76 JHR def. #19 Coyne (4-25)
	#45 RLLR def. #77 JHR (18-22)
Week #12 (Nashville)	#77 JHR def. #20 ECR (15-23)
	#8 Ganassi def. #45 RLLR (9-17)
	#28 Andretti def. #76 JHR (6-12)
	#47 RLLR def. #15 RLLR (8-19)
Week #13 (Portland)	#45 RLLR def.  #20 ECR (15-19)
	#76 JHR def. #15 RLLR (4-23)
	#28 Andretti def. #19 Coyne (6-13)
	#47 RLLR def. #77 JHR (16-22)
Week #14 (Markham)	#28 Andretti def. #20 ECR (1-20)
	#77 JHR def. #8 Ganassi (11-14)
	#76 JHR def. #47 RLLR (7-25)
	#15 RLLR def. #19 Coyne (9-15)

League Two Standings

#45 RLLR 8-4

#8 Ganassi 8-4

#76 JHR 8-5

#28 Andretti 7-5

#15 RLLR 6-6

#20 ECR 6-7

#77 JHR 6-7

#19 Coyne 4-8

#47 RLLR 3-10

It is insanely tight in League Two with everyone having either three or four matchups remaining. The only team eliminated from promotion is the #47 RLLR.

The #45 RLLR is 2-0 against the #8 Ganassi. The #45 RLLR defeated the #76 JHR at Detroit, and these two will meet in the penultimate race of the season at Milwaukee. The #28 Andretti has won a race outright this season and is on the outside of promotion. The good news for the #28 Andretti is it faces the bottom two teams in the final four weeks. It also has the #45 RLLR in the first Milwaukee race. 

The #19 Coyne entry has lost four consecutive matchups with four matchups remaining and needing to win all of those with some help to have any shot to finish in the top three. 

We will come back when the season is complete and see how everything shakes out.

Track Walk: Washington, D.C. 2026

The 15th race of the 2026 NTT IndyCar Series season features the series third inaugural event of the season with the Grand Prix of Washington, D.C. It joins Arlington and Markham as the other debut events this season, all three being street races. The race will take place on a 1.7-mile street course that will race pass the United States Capitol Building, along Pennsylvania Avenue and around the National Mall. This is the first time IndyCar has raced in the nation's capital. 

Coverage

Time: Coverage begins at 11:30 a.m. ET on Sunday August 23 with green flag scheduled for 1:13 p.m. ET.
Channel: Fox
Announcers: Will Buxton, Townsend Bell and James Hinchcliffe will be in the booth. Kevin Lee, Georgia Henneberry and Jack Harvey will work pit lane.

IndyCar Weekend Schedule

Saturday:

First Practice: 9:05 a.m. ET (75 minutes)

Second Practice: 1:05 p.m. ET (75 minutes)
Qualifying: 5:00 p.m. ET 
Sunday:
Warm-up: 9:15 a.m. ET (30 minutes)
Race: 1:13 p.m. ET (90 laps)

Palou's Championship Hopes

In IndyCar's historic race in Washington, D.C., it could see history made beyond the location of the event. Álex Palou will enter this race with a chance at clinching his fourth consecutive championship and the fifth in his career. 

Palou increased his championship lead in Markham with a fourth-place finish while all his nearest competitors suffered retirements. The Catalan driver left Canada up 133 points on Kyle Kirkwood and 137 points clear of David Malukas. Christian Lundgaard is 139 points back in fourth. After the 14th race last season, Palou had a 121-point championship lead. 

The championship could be clinched in Washington. All it would take is Palou leaving with at least a 162-point championship lead. 

Palou would clinch the championship this weekend with a maximum points victory, 54 points, with Kirkwood finished eighth or worse with no bonus points, Malukas finishing sixth or worse with no bonus points and Lundgaard finishing fifth or worse with no bonus points.

Clinching the championship with three races remaining would be the earliest since Cristiano da Matta sealed the 2002 CART championship with three races remaining. It would be the 13th time since 1946 an IndyCar championship would be claimed with at least three races remaining. Palou would join Rodger Ward, A.J. Foyt, Mario Andretti and Sébastien Bourdais as the only drivers to have clinched the championship early on at least three occasions. 

This would be the first time the championship did not go to the wire in consecutive seasons since Bourdais claimed the Champ Car title with a race to spare in 2005, 2006 and 2007. Palou would match Bourdais' record streak of four consecutive titles from 2004 to 2007. Palou's fifth title would place him into third all-time in championships behind A.J. Foyt's seven and Scott Dixon's six.

Eight other drivers remain mathematically alive for the championship. 

Kirkwood is 133 points back, but he is coming off only his second finish outside the top ten this season when he hit the barrier in turn three at Markham. Finishing 21st is Kirkwood's worst result since he had an accident in the first Iowa race last season and was 26th. Malukas was 17th in Markham, his second consecutive result outside the top ten. It is the first time Malukas has gone consecutive races without a top ten finish at Team Penske. 

Lundgaard is fourth in the championship, and he has finished in the top ten in six of the last seven races. The only road or street course Lundgaard has not finished in the top ten this season is Long Beach, where he was 20th. Patricio O'Ward round out the championship top five, 157 points behind Palou. 

Josef Newgarden is sixth, 190 points behind Palou, with Newgarden's Team Penske teammate Scott McLaughlin 197 points back. Felix Rosenqvist is a point behind McLaughlin. 

Marcus Ericsson's Markham victory kept him alive for the championship. The bad news is Ericsson will be eliminated as soon as Palou starts in Washington, D.C. Even if Ericsson were to win with the maximum 54 points, Palou finishing with only five points, the minimum for starting an IndyCar race, would put Palou 164 points ahead of Ericsson with only 162 points remaining on the table over the final three races. 

With six victories, Palou holds any potential tiebreaker over almost all remaining championship rivals. Only two drivers could end this season tied drivers in victories with Palou, Christian Lundgaard and Josef Newgarden. Lundgaard would theoretically hold the tiebreaker as he has two runner-up finishes to Palou's one while Newgarden also has one runner-up finish, and Newgarden and Palou each have one fourth-place finish this season, but Palou has finished fifth in three races while newgarden's next best finish is seventh. In all likelihood, the championship will not come down to a tiebreaker. 

Not All These Drivers Can Win This Season

The championship is becoming clear, but what remains unclear is who could win the remaining four races.  With Ericsson's triumphant in Markham, seven drivers have won a race this season, leaving 18 winless. Not all 18 can win a race. In fact, at best at least 14 of the 25 full-time drivers will be winless when this season is all said and done. 

A fair number of notable names have yet to win this season, and it is getting late early for all of them. 

David Malukas is the top driver in the championship without a victory. Malukas is third in the championship, but his first career victory remains out of his grasp despite a few promising runs earlier this season at Phoenix, the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, the Indianapolis 500 and Nashville. A winless driver has not finished in the top three of the championship since Hélio Castroneves was third in 2016 despite failing to win a race. Castroneves' best finish that season was second on two occasions. The championship runner-up has not gone winless since 1998 when Davey Hamilton was second in the championship behind Kenny Bräck.

The next best driver in the championship without a victory is another Team Penske driver. Scott McLaughlin has not won a race in 32 starts, dating back to the penultimate race of the 2024 season. The most recent full-time Team Penske driver to go winless in consecutive seasons is Hélio Castroneves, who went winless in 2015 and 2016. Team Penske has not had a season where a majority of its full-time drivers went winless since 2011 when Castroneves and Ryan Briscoe each went winless. Will Power did win six of 17 races that season. 

The only other driver ranked in the championship top ten without a victory is Rinus VeeKay in tenth, but VeeKay has finished in the top ten in four of the last six races. VeeKay is also attempting to win with a team that has yet to win in its IndyCar history. Washington, D.C. will mark the 101st for Juncos Hollinger Racing in IndyCar. The team has a combined one podium finish and eight top five finishes. It has been 92 races since VeeKay's only IndyCar victory in the 2021 Grand Prix of Indianapolis.

Will Power has finished third on four occasions this season. That is the best Power has done in his inaugural season with Andretti Global. Combined with eight finishes outside the top ten, these results leave the Australian outside the championship top ten, only three points behind VeeKay. 

Then comes Scott Dixon, a driver who has won a race in 21 consecutive seasons dating back to 2005. Dixon has finished outside the top ten in eight consecutive races. He has not finished in the top ten since he was sixth in the Grand Prix of Indianapolis. Through the first 14 races, Dixon has led 78 laps, but 64 of those laps were between the Indianapolis 500 and Gateway. He has only led two laps this year on road or street courses, and that was two laps in St. Petersburg. The last time Dixon did not win one of the first 14 races in a season was in 2014. He won the 15th race at Mid-Ohio and then won the 17th race of that season at Sonoma.

Graham Rahal will enter Washington, D.C. on a 155-race winless streak, the longest in IndyCar. A victory would surpass Rahal's own record for longest winless streak in IndyCar history. He went 124 starts between his first career victory at St. Petersburg in 2008 and Fontana in 2015. 

Searching for Redemption

A few drivers left Markham wishing for something greater. 

Louis Foster likely thought he was on his way to victory in Canada. Foster scored a surprising pole position and he led the first 32 laps. Though shuffled out of the lead due to the pit cycle, Foster was passing drivers and looked poised to race back to the lead and back in control of the race. Instead, Foster clipped the inside barrier of turn three while passing Marcus Ericsson, careening Foster into the outside barrier and ending his race after completing 42 of 90 laps. 

Instead of having his best day in IndyCar, Foster wound up with his sixth consecutive finish outside the top ten. He dropped to 19th in the championship as well. Foster led more laps in Markham than he had in his first 30 IndyCar starts.

While Foster was heartbroken in a bad way, Romain Grosjean was brought to tears over near glory. Using an unconventional strategy, Grosjean found himself leading in the final stint from Markham, but also saving fuel as he was attempting to go 38 laps on the final stint. While Grosjean was able to go the distance, he was not able to have the pace to fend off all comers, and Marcus Ericsson passed the Frenchman without much issue. Grosjean was able to claim second, but over 7.5 seconds off the race winner. 

It was Grosjean's first top five finish of the season, and his best finish since he was second to Scott McLaughlin in the 2023 Grand Prix of Alabama, but it now means Grosjean has gone winless in his first 77 starts in IndyCar. Only nine drivers have taken more than 77 starts to earn their first career victory. 

Foster and Grosjean may have been close to something special and are hoping Washington, D.C. will see them obtain what was within their grasps, a number of drivers would settle for a good day.

Marcus Armstrong's engine lasted until the checkered flag in Markham, but Armstrong's spin and stall cost him a promising result. A subsequent penalty for disobey orders from the officials when Armstrong attempted to spin his car around as the pace car was approaching, a move that did not work and only made the track blockage worse, cemented Armstrong's status a lap down. It was the fifth consecutive race Armstrong has finished outside the top ten, four of those being results outside the top fifteen. 

Alexander Rossi has finished 20th or worse in four consecutive races, and he has finished outside the top fifteen in eight of the last nine races. Rossi was in the top ten in two of the first three street course races this season, he was ninth in both Arlington and Long Beach. He has not finished in the top five on a street course since he was fifth in the 2024 Detroit race.

Dennis Hauger has now gone eight races without a top ten finish, and it was a missed opportunity after Hauger started fifth in Markham. Even after a disastrous restart after the first caution of the race saw Hauger drop 15 laps in a blink, he was still competing for a top ten finish in the closing laps until an incident on the last lap ended his race early.

Christian Rasmussen was caught in another accident, and Rasmussen has now finished outside the top twenty in three consecutive races and in eight of 14 races this season. Rookies Caio Collet and Mick Schumacher each had incidents in Canada. Collet was 19th, completing 67 laps. Schumacher was dead last after his clipped the inside barrier in turn four. These three drivers are all competing for the final Leader Circle spot. Rasmussen holds a six-point advantage over Collet with Schumacher a further seven points on the outside. 

Going the Distance

The Grand Prix of Washington, D.C. will not only be historic because of where the race is being held, but at 147 laps around the 1.7-mile circuit, the race will have a scheduled distance of 249.9 miles, the longest road/street course race of the season, and one of the longest street races in modern IndyCar history. It is one of seven races on the 2026 calendar with a scheduled distance essentially of 250 miles or greater. 

Street courses have been long associated with IndyCar, but the first modern street course race in IndyCar history was not held until the 1983 Caesars Palace Grand Prix. If you want to get technical, the Grand Prix of Cleveland held at Burke Lakefront Airport was the first modern temporary circuit race, held for the first time the year prior in 1982. 

The first two Cleveland races were scheduled and run to 310 miles in distance, 125 laps around the temporary circuit. The inaugural Cleveland race was held on July 4, 1982 and Bobby Rahal took the victory ahead of Mario Andretti and Al Unser. Unser won the following year with Pete Halmser in second and Teo Fabi in third. The 2002 and 2003 Cleveland races were each 115 laps, 242.19 miles. Patrick Carpentier won ahead of Michael Andretti and Paul Tracy in 2002. The 2003 Cleveland race was held under the lights. Sébastien Bourdais won from pole position with Paul Tracy finishing second and Bruno Junqueira was third. 

The 2002 Road America race was longer than Cleveland that season, running for 60 laps, 242.88 miles. Cristiano da Matta won the Road America race with Alex Tagliani in second and Junqueira finishing third again. It was da Matta's sixth of seven victories that season. This is the most recent road/street course to exceed 240 miles in length.

The last time a road/street course race was run to at least the distance of this year's race from Washington, D.C. was IndyCar's final race held at Riverside International Raceway. On August 23, 1983, a 313.5-mile, 95-lap race was held at Riverside, a little over a month-and-a-half after the second Cleveland race. Bobby Rahal won that Riverside race. All six races held at Riverside between 1967 to 1969 and 1981 to 1983 were over 300 miles in length. Dan Gurney won the first two races before Mario Andretti capped off his 1969 championship season with a Riverside victory. Rick Mears won the 1981 and 1982 Riverside races.

At 147 laps, Washington, D.C. is the most laps for a street course race since the final Meadowlands race in 1991. Three of the final four races held around Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey were run to 150 laps on a 1.217-mile course. The 1989 race was scheduled for 150 laps but stopped five laps from the scheduled distance due to heavy rain.

With 147 laps scheduled, it opens the door for a driver possibly leading at least 100 laps, On 20 occasions has a driver led at least 100 laps in a road or street course race. Will Power is the most recent to do it. Power led 101 of 110 laps on his way to victory in the 2024 Portland race. On 17 of the 20 occasions has the driver leading 100 laps gone on to win the race. The most recent driver to lead at least 100 laps in a road/street course race and not win was Gil de Ferran at Long Beach in 1996. De Ferran led 100 of the first 101 laps before a turbocharger issue slowed the Brazilian, and it allowed Jimmy Vasser to lead the final four laps and take victory.

Fast Facts

This will be the 12th IndyCar race to take place on August 23, and the first since Takuma Sato won the 2020 Indianapolis 500, a race delayed nearly three months due to the global pandemic. 

The most recent road/street course event held on August 23 was the 2009 Sonoma race. Dario Franchitti led all 75 laps from pole position.

The pole-sitter has won only three of the last 12 street course races (Colton Herta at Toronto in 2024, Kyle Kirkwood at Long Beach in 2025, Álex Palou at Detroit in June).

Eighteen consecutive street races have been won from a top ten starting position, 13 of those have been from a top five starting position. 

Five of 14 races this season have been won from the fourth starting position, the most proficient starting position this season. 

Fifth starting position has not produced a winner in the last 20 races. The most recent winner from fifth was Patricio O'Ward in the first Iowa race last season. Fifth starting position has not won a road course race since Will Power won at Road America in 2024, and it has not won a street course race since Scott Dixon won at Detroit in 2024, the race prior to Power's victory.

Honda has won 12 of the last 14 street course races, and Patricio O'Ward is responsible for the two Chevrolet victories. One of those was the 2024 St. Petersburg race, where O'Ward inherited the victory after Josef Newgarden was disqualified. The other was last year at Toronto where O'Ward won from tenth.

Dating back to 2023, Honda has won 17 of 19 street course races.

Honda has won three consecutive races. Neither manufacturer has won more than three consecutive races since Honda won 11 consecutive races stretching from the 2024 Nashville season finale through the first ten races of last season. 

Nine different countries were represented in the top nine at Markham (Sweden, France, Australia, Spain, Mexico, Denmark, Netherlands, New Zealand and United States).

Washington, D.C. becomes the second nation's capital to host an IndyCar race. The first was Mexico City. Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez hosted eight races spread over 1980 to 2007.

This is the first time IndyCar has had consecutive street races since the 2024 season opener with St. Petersburg and Long Beach. Prior to that, excluding doubleheader weekends, IndyCar has not had consecutive street race weekends since the 2017 season opened with St. Petersburg and Long Beach.

There have been 99 races since the last time a driver led every lap in an IndyCar race. That was Will Power in the second Harvest Grand Prix race from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course on October 3, 2020.

The first three street course races of the season featured two cautions or fewer, and none of the races had more than 7% of its laps run under caution. The last two street races have featured at least five cautions, and each race had at least 23% of its laps run under caution. 

Marcus Ericsson has scored fastest lap in the last two races. It is the first time a driver has scored consecutive fastest laps since Álex Palou did it last season at Barber Motorsports Park and the Grand Prix of Indianapolis.

The most recent driver to have at least three consecutive fastest laps was Sébastien Bourdais, who had six consecutive fastest laps during the 2007 Champ Car season (Houston, Portland, Cleveland, Mont-Tremblant, Toronto, Edmonton).

Eight drivers have finished third-place this season. Four of those drivers, who are responsible for nine third-place finishes in the first 14 races, are ranked outside the championship top ten (Will Power, Scott Dixon, Graham Rahal and Christian Rasmussen).

Predictions

Álex Palou, but if it isn't Álex Palou, you know damn well Team Penske is winning the race Roger Penske spent $35 million to organize. No offense to Scott McLaughlin, a naturalized United States citizen, but it will be one of the natives. Sure, let's give it to David Malukas. Doesn't that add up? Basically a child, first career victory in a race that will likely never be held before, in what will be Malukas' 76th career start, coinciding with the celebration of the 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence. That tracks. There will be at least five cautions for at least 30 laps, but the longest green flag run will be greater than 50 laps. At least one driver will run all 147 laps on three stops. Of the six drivers that have finished in the top ten of at least the last two races, four of them will not finish in the top ten in Washington, D.C. Sleeper: Graham Rahal.

Second Impressions: Markham 2026

1. On second viewing, Marcus Ericsson's victory in Markham was outstanding. In a messy race, an unusual strategy that bucked preconceived notions of paths to success did not appear to be the best way to the top, but with almost everyone else needing to save at least a little fuel, Ericsson's team's choice to run as long as he could to shortened the final stint was brilliant strategy. It allowed Ericsson to push toward the end of his middle stint while everyone was still running conservative, some more than others, and it allowed Ericsson to emerge from the pit lane in sixth position instead of being much further down the order. The lap before Ericsson's in-lap was his fastest of the race.

Ericsson's final stint was set-up to be a 22-lap sprint against drivers whose final stints were 38 laps in length (Romain Grosjean), 31 laps in length (Will Power) and 36 laps in length (Álex Palou, Scott McLaughlin, Rinus VeeKay and David Malukas). McLaughlin and VeeKay each fell out of the running on pace. Malukas had to watch his pace and smacked the barrier for good measure when he had already lost ground. Ericsson still had work to do. With 15 laps remaining, it looked settled to be Grosjean vs. Palou as Ericsson was still in fifth-place and over eight seconds behind the leader. This strategy paid off in the closing laps. 

Palou struggled with tire wear at the end and could not even mount a challenge on Grosjean. Grosjean had to run a specific pace to make it on fuel. Power was the only other racy driver in the lead group, but even the nine-lap difference proved to be too much for Power to hold off. Ericsson laid a hip check on Power to pass in the hairpin, but the Swede was destined to get that position even without needing to be that aggressive. 

All that was left was Grosjean in Ericsson's sights and it took him no time to take the lead. Grosjean wa defenseless. Once he got to the lead, Ericsson's advantage was on full display. He won by over 7.5 seconds and he only took the lead with five laps remaining. What appeared to be a foolish strategy that was going to cost the team glory turned into a emphatic victory.

2. We touched upon Romain Grosjean yesterday, but he pulled off a rather staggering strategy to finish second. He had to run 36 laps in the middle stint and then 38 laps in the final stint. Now, the middle stint saw 16 of the 36 laps run under caution. That helped him get that far. Grosjean's final pit stop happened simultaneously as Kyle Kirkwood hitting the barrier and bringing out a caution, which could not have worked out better for Grosjean. He was going to need a handful of caution laps to get him to the finish. He got four immediately and then another three after that when Josef Newgarden was spun in the hairpin. 

If Ericsson was not the lone driver to remain out after what turned into the final caution of the race, Grosjean probably wins this race. Maybe Power or even Ericsson would have been able to apply pressure and run Grosjean out of fuel or been able to pass him had Ericsson also stopped on lap 60, but Grosjean was three seconds up the road from Power for second. One team bucking all conventional wisdom is frankly what kept Grosjean from victory as Grosjean and Dale Coyne Racing also bucked conventional wisdom with their strategy. 

Just when you think you do enough being completely crazy, someone just happens to be crazier than you.

3. Will Power was third. He drove an incredible race to finish third. He was active early. The team had the strategy worked out, and it was probably the right choice for Andretti Global to split the strategy and not have both cars stop with 31 laps remaining. It was probably the difference between the team finishing 1-3 and 2-3. Though I am not sure who would have been second if Power and Ericsson had each stopped on the same lap.

4. I hate when a driver makes a mistake and we call him human. We know Álex Palou is human. Did you see how he handled contract negotiations? Qualifying accident aside, the same can go with Palou in this race and Palou not having the pace at the end. It doesn't always work out. It looked promising, and then the tires fell off, but Palou didn't need to finish first or second or third. All his championship rivals shot themselves in the foot. If we were to have given Palou another 19 points for a victory, he would have been 152 points clear and would just need to outscore the competition by ten more points to clinch the championship in Washington, D.C.

That isn't the case, but Palou is going to clinch the title. It could still be claimed in Washington, D.C. with another repeat of Markham, which I am not sure we can rule out, or it will be claimed in Milwaukee, likely on Saturday afternoon. 

5. I am not sure how Patricio O'Ward finished fifth but he looked more competitive in the race than he did all weekend prior. The car found its form. Stopping with 31 laps to go likely got him a handful of more positions as McLaughlin and VeeKay had to save fuel, but O'Ward was pushing for fourth. That car found its sweet spot during the race, and it led to a far more impressive result than was expected at the start of Sunday.

6. I don't think Christian Lundgaard did anything wrong in this race to finish sixth. He surprisingly stopped early and committed to a three-stop strategy, but stopping on lap 16 was the same strategy Grosjean took. The difference is no one knew how many cautions would come. Grosjean's team rode it out and decided to turn this into a two-stopper. Lundgaard made the move to stop under caution at lap 33 to set up a final pit stop within the final fuel window. It shook out for Lundgaard to finish sixth but he didn't really do anything wrong. It is hard to find fault with his strategy either. If everyone knew how the cautions would have fallen they all would have done something different. Ericsson was fortunate the final 29 laps were caution-free. One caution on lap 67 and Ericsson is finished ninth or tenth at best.

7. Rinus VeeKay looked to be the first benefactor when he stopped just before Mick Schumacher's caution. Then VeeKay lost spots on the restarts and sustained front wing damage, and he still would up on a top five position, but needed to save fuel and dropped to seventh. Some races work out that way. I think every driver flip-flopped from being screwed by a caution and benefitting from a caution each time the yellow came out. It ended up somewhat benefitting VeeKay even if seventh doesn't feel like a great result. 

8. This was a pretty good race for Scott McLaughlin and the need to save fuel in the final stint is what cost him, but did it ever feel like McLaughlin was a threat? Even when McLaughlin was second to Louis Foster and then second to Grosjean, it never felt like McLaughlin was going to pounce. In the early stages, it felt like Ericsson was the bigger threat behind McLaughlin in third, and then Palou was the bigger threat in the final stint while running behind McLaughlin. 

That has been the story of McLaughlin's season. It has been good, but outside of St. Petersburg and maybe Nashville, have we really felt McLaughlin is a true contender and someone everyone will need to beat for victory? 

9. Graham Rahal took ninth. Rahal spent a fair amount of the race in the top ten, but he never was pushing for more. He could hold his spot but we never really saw Rahal on the offensive, and yet ninth feels right for this team.

10. To paint how messy this race was, Santino Ferrucci took tenth and Ferrucci never looked competitive this weekend. Someone had to finish tenth. Ferrucci mostly kept his nose clean and it got him a far better result than his performance this weekend would have suggested.

11. Next case in point for how messy this race was, Sting Ray Robb was 11th and Nolan Siegel was 12th. Siegel did leap some laps and ran a fair amount in the top five because of his pit strategy, but Siegel was shuffled back. Robb didn't even run that well. He had a few wide runs into corners, and Robb is essentially the reason Marcus Armstrong spun, as Robb ran Armstrong wide and Armstrong spun partially as an evasive move to miss the barrier but also because Armstrong was run into the marbles off line on the exit of the hairpin. 

12. Speaking of Siegel, he received an avoidable contact penalty for spinning Josef Newgarden, and Newgarden ended up a position behind Siegel in 13th. Newgarden started 20th and didn't really factor in this one. The most time he spent in the top ten was right before Siegel hit him. Maybe Newgarden would have been seventh or eighth without that contact but that is the best his race would have been. 

13. Kyffin Simpson was the final car on the leap lap in 14th, and Simpson nearly spoiled the party with a spin in the hairpin with five laps remaining. The officials let Simpson clear himself, which has not been the officials M.O. of late. We didn't need a late restart to help this race. Thankful, Simpson was given the time to point his car in the right direction. 

14. It was never explained what happened to Dennis Hauger because he was 11th at the start of the final lap and then did not complete it, and he was placed 15th. It was a strange race for Hauger. He was fuel saving early or at least didn't have the pace and after the first restart was shuffled from the top five to 20th in a blink. He kind of recovered and was running in the top ten before losing spots late in the race. Something wasn't quite right for Hauger in this one. 

15. Let's breeze through the rest of the field...

Marcus Armstrong was a lap down after the spin with Robb's assistance. Armstrong took a stop-and-hold penalty for ignoring a safety working trying to hold him because Armstrong was trying to spin back around before the pace car pull through, only for Armstrong to unsuccessfully flick his car in the right direction and proceeding to block the track. 

I understand why Armstrong attempted it. I don't understand why the safety workers don't point the car in the right direction so a driver can restart pointing the right direction. They have the jack with the wheels on it to spin the car around. There was no need to hold Armstrong while facing oncoming traffic and essentially trap him a lap down if they have the ability to point him in the right direction.

I did agree when McLaughlin and company got their positions back after that because they had to slow for essentially a blocked track because a driver didn't listen to instructions. There was no reason for McLaughlin and others to lose out because of Armstrong neglected orders from the officials. Two wrongs do not make a right folks. Rights make rights. The officials did the right thing.

16. I said I was going to breeze through the field and then had to take a detour on the Armstrong incident, which was another bad result form Armstrong and another miserable weekend for him, but I digress...

David Malukas smacked the barrier late and it cost him a top ten finish. It wasn't the greatest day for Malukas, and he was set to lose points anyway in the championship. I don't think he was driving over his head. I think he clipped the barrier late trying to save fuel.

Scott Dixon spun after contact with Dennis Hauger and Dixon collected Christian Rasmussen in the process. This was an incident that happens on a street course. Dixon came down on Hauger. Hauger had nowhere to go. I don't think Dixon didn't anything wrong. He just wasn't clear at that point. Racing incidents still exist in this world. Rasmussen cannot catch a break on a street course. Dixon was able to continue after repairing his suspension, but lost many laps in the process. Rasmussen's day was over before halfway. 

Caio Collet had suspension damage early and essentially ran a 67-lap test session. It does feel like Collet is driving with pressure on him, which is a little nuts, but he is driving for A.J. Foyt Racing. If we find out in a week or two the team has told Collet results must improve or he will be dropped it would surprise no one, but it is also A.J. Foyt Racing. They will replace Collet, have the same results and then be looking for another new driver in 2028 as well. 

Alexander Rossi had a tire puncture, which we are pinning on Álex Palou for contact in the hairpin. If we are going to penalize all contact these races are going to become stale. Incidentally contact must exist. Sometimes it will bite you. Two cars side-by-side bumping on exit of a 30 mph hairpin and unfortunately resulting in a cut tire should not be a penalty. It almost doesn't matter because Rossi suffered a gearbox failure and that ended his race. 

Another mechanical issue for Ed Carpenter Racing. Interesting. 

17. Kyle Kirkwood was 21st. Louis Foster was 22nd. Both cars clipped the barrier on the inside of turn three. We covered it yesterday, but for Foster this is a harsh result because he felt like possibly the driver to beat in this race. It is hard to pin this on the driver. We see drivers clip the inside of turns before. Scott Dixon did it at Belle Isle not long ago. It is a risk on a street course. Kirkwood could have been in the top five without this incident. Kirkwood's accident is what really secured Palou the title.

18. Two more retirements: Felix Rosenqvist was done after 18 laps with fuel pressure issues. Rosenqvist never really got to participate in this race. It would have been fun to see what kind of strategy Meyer Shank Racing would have run for him.

Mick Schumacher was the first victim of an inside barrier. Schumacher clipped the inside of turn four on lap 15 while running in the top ten. Two Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing cars were outside the top twenty, which makes it hard to say the team should be positive about this weekend, but it should be. All three cars made the second round of qualifying. Schumacher looked comfortable. Foster was one of the fastest cars in this race. Rahal spent a lot of time in the top ten. 

We have seen enough of these races from RLLR to know the team will likely still be spotty, but it should be pleased it went to a new course and all three cars were at the front even if the results didn't go their way. 

18. It is late, this is a second impressions, and we haven't spoken about the issues from Markham, notably the delays to circuit construction that led to a lost practice day on Friday. We will come back around to those. 

19. I do want to end on this... Marcus Ericsson's 63 starts between victories, is the fifth-longest drought in IndyCar history. The only longer droughts are Graham Rahal (124), Johnny Rutherford (97), Marco Andretti (77) and Mario Andretti (73). It doesn't feel like it has been that long since Ericsson won a race. Three-and-a-half years is not nothing, but it doesn't feel like Ericsson has been down for that long. It is not necessarily the history you want, but it does mean you did something well for a drought to end.