Will Power wins while Alex Palou takes his fourth title: 2025 IndyCar Grand Prix of Portland race results

Will Power wins the 2025 IndyCar Grand Prix of Portland to prove to Penske and his critics that he is deserving of a new contract for 2026.

Dominant early in the race, Power showed his experience within the season after he handled intense pressure from behind from Christian Lundgaard and Alex Palou following the final pitstops.

Weaving through backmarkers in front of him, Power was relieved from the pressure after Alex Palou tried an aggressive move around the outside of Lundgaard into Turn 7.

The Arrow McLaren driver responded to the overtake with a tough defense that saw Palou take to the grass out of the turn which dropped him and Lundgaard out of an attacking position to allow Power to breeze to his first win this season.

Rumoured to be replaced by David Malukas for 2026, Power’s win at Portland is Penske’s only win in the 2025 season.

Speaking after the race, Power said: “I think it's just a big win for all the team, man. We've had a rough year and it's not really because we've been off the pace.

“It's just been unfortunate circumstances. I've had two engine failures [and a] tire failure. We picked a strategy to run hard and formed enough of a gap, [it was] a bit dicey at the end there but [I’m]  just stoked.

“I've had a great career with Verizon and Penske, so I really, really enjoyed winning for the guys and everyone I've worked with for a long time.”

Although Palou can no longer beat AJ Foyt’s record number of wins in a season, he was able to walk away from Portland as the 2025 IndyCar champion after Pato O’Ward had an electrical wire issue that saw him return to the race ten laps behind the lead.

Initially leading the race, O’Ward pitted to put himself on the same strategy as Lundgaard moments before his car began to slow on track.

O’Ward was unable to recover his race and finished dead last and handed Palou his title.

This makes Palou a four-time IndyCar champion and fifth most accoladed IndyCar driver of all time.

Lundgaard finished second after a strong drive from seventh following a six place grid penalty for an unapproved engine change on Saturday.

Close to taking home his first win for Arrow McLaren, the Danish driver proved once again that he is as capable as O’Ward in fighting for wins.

“I think if we would have started further up, I think the result would have been a little different today”, Lundgaard admitted.

“I think we could have had power. We gave it everything we had. Obviously, I don't really know what's happened to Pato yet, I mean it's just unfortunate for the five car so at least we could pick up some of the pieces.”

“I think everybody's recharged so much throughout last week, the week off and I said it a couple of days ago, there was no racing without the sparkies, there's no racing without the mechanics.

“That’s two P2s in a row [which] is nice but it's also really annoying because that means we were first loser twice.”

Lap-by-lap

A steady start to the race, Santino Ferrucci kicked started the action after he spun up the rears out of the final turn and onto the main straight and spun before he smacked the pit wall.

Out of the race, Santino brought out the first Caution which allowed several of the drivers at the back of the grid to make their first stops, all of which switched to the alternate tyre.

Amongst the first pit stoppers were Graham Rahal and Callum Ilott who finished fourth and sixth after the early stop slingshotted up the grid.

O’Ward led the field to green following the Caution and caught Rosenqvist napping who ended up two car lengths behind O’Ward onto the main straight.

Clean at the front of the field into Turn One again, Louis Foster spun out of the first turn after a hit by Kyffin Simpson which led to a sympathy spin from Rinus VeeKay while he tried to avoid the Englishman.

Simpson was later handed a penalty for the incident.

Another Caution brought out, Rosenqvist was given a second chance and was almost able to redeem himself and he looked to overtake O’Ward for the lead.

Lundgaard made hay out of the restart however and overtook both Alexander Rossi and David Malukas and began to pressure Alex Palou in fourth.

Attention quickly turned to the group of cars at the back who pitted for fresh alternates.

Battling for position, Christian Rasmussen and Conor Daly made a trip into the grass while squabbling but it ended in tears for Daly who had a big crash after Rasmussen tapped his rear out of Turn 7 which sent Daly flying sideways and huge speed into the wall.

Daly was able to step out of the car by himself and was cleared by medical following the crash.

Speaking to FS1, Daly said: “I saw him drive Colton [Herta] almost into the wall in the back straight. He was quite slow and so I tried to pass him into seven and then again drove himself off the track to make sure that I drove off the track

“I’m not really sure of the point of that, it kind of seems stupid in my opinion, and then he was really slow down the straight and I just went to pass him and then he just never stopped.

“That's a really dangerous corner to try to do that. I feel like I had a lot more grip on reds and I was pretty happy to turn in from there.

“I would say that was quite an unsavoury move and I don't really understand it.”

Bringing out the third Caution of the day, both O’Ward and Rosenqvist took the opportunity to pit while third place sitter, Will Power, decided to stay out and was promoted to first.

Rosenqvist chose to put on scrub alternates while O’Ward put on a new set of the harder prime compound.

Palou stayed on track with Power and moved to second while Lundgaard also decided to pit to undercut the champion-elect.

Moments after his pitstop and once the track was back to green, O’Ward began to slow after his engine began to face issues which meant the Mexican had to pull over into the pits.

Arrow McLaren Team Principal and indyCar veteran, Tony Kanaan, confirmed that it was an electrical wire issue that escalated to “burn the box” on O’Ward’s 5 IndyCar.

Arrow McLaren and Chevy tried to revive O’Ward’s car but it seemed that both his day and championship hopes were to end early in the race.

Power began to build a lead on Palou in second with Scott McLaughlin managing to drive his way into third.

McLaughlin was the first to blink and pit as the race entered the second third which led to both Power and Palou to react.

Power pitted with an eight second lead over Palou which proved to be crucial in the battle for the aggregate lead as Power came out in front of Rosenqvist and Lundgaard.

Lundgaard managed to get past Rosenqvist to chase after Power in first but the Penske driver began to stretch his legs out front from yesterday’s P1 Award winner.

Pitting much earlier than Power, Lundgaard was forced to come into the pitlane for new tyres on lap 49 and dropped back to 14th

Palou returned to second but in the second half of the race but due to his time stuck in traffic was nearly 20 seconds behind the race leader.

One in clean air, Palou was able to slowly chink away at Power’s lead and at one point was nearly three quarters of a lap faster than Power.

As the race entered the second half of the race, Power reported to his team that he was suffering from bad degradation which led Team Penske to make the decision to call him in.

Power returned to track on a set of hard tyres and was still in the aggregate lead with Lundgaard behind the Penske driver in seventh with Callum Ilott between the two drivers..

Palou responded to Power’s pitstop laps later but put on a set of used softs to continue his chase. He returned to track in sixth and behind Lundgaard putting him in an aggregate third.

On a different strategy Ilott held up Lundgaard before  he pitted, which freed the Dane to chase after Power with the gap quickly brought down to 1.6 seconds.

Lundgaard managed to get within a second of Power before he began to save fuel due to his alternate strategy to both Power and Palou.

The Danish driver worked to stay out as long as possible but his fuel saving began to allow the much quicker Palou to begin to reel him in setting lap times nearly a second faster than the Arrow McLaren driver.

With 30 laps to go, Lundgaard darted into the pits to protect himself from the charging Palou and to try and undercut Power and changed to a set of new soft tyres.

The Australian driver was forced to respond the next lap to stop Lundgaard breezing by and came back out onto track still in the lead in seventh.

The only tyres available to Power were a set of used softs.

This made him vulnerable to Lundgaard who immediately closed in on Power ahead as the two tried to overtake Andretti’s Marcus Ericsson.

In a Honda-powered Andretti, the two front runners began to get stuck behind Ericsson which helped Palou close in before he pitted and returned to track five seconds behind Lundgaard.

Minutes after Palou’s stop, Newgarden also made his final pitstop but was pushed by Scott Dixon out of the turn one chicane which caused the American to spin.

Close to bringing out a Caution, Newgarden managed to get the car moving again and avoided a late Caution.

Unable to pass Ericsson, Palou closed in on the front two with 18 laps to go as a train began to form behind the Andretti driver.

A difficult track to overtake on, Palou’s Honda engine seemed to become a defining factor over his competitors who are both powered by the slower Chevy powertrain.

Palou made his first attack on Lundgaard into Turn 7 briefly passing the Dane before the Arrow McLaren retook the position down the back straight to barely hold onto second.

Aggressive on his attempts, Palou tried to squeeze past on the outside of Turn Six which in return he received a strong defense from Lundgaard who pushed Palou onto the grass on the exit.

Palou returned to track three seconds behind the lead and relieved Power of pressure from behind and allowed him to drive to take the race win.