Starting from pole Car 10 Alex Palou won the Java House Grand Prix of Monterey for 19th NTT IndyCar Series win. This is his 8th win & 11th Top 5 of 2025. 2nd Place Car 7 Christian Lundgaard, started from 7th place posted his 5th Top 5 of 2025. 3rd Place Car 26 Colton Herta, started from 3rd posted his 5th Top 5 of 2025.
4th Place Car 5 Pato O’Ward, started from 2nd place followed by 5th place Car 9 Scott Dixon, started from 19th place. 6th Place Car 90 Callum Ilott, started from 24th place followed by 7th place Car 12 Will Power, started from 5th place. 8th Place Car 66 Marcus Armstrong, started from 10th place followed by 9th place Car 21 Christian Rasmussen, started from 11th place. Lastly in the Top 10 was Car 3 Scott McLaughlin, started from 13th place. Canadian Car 30 Devlin DeFrancesco finished in 20th place.
The race had 5 Caution for 13 Laps: 1st Caution on lap 1 for Contact Cars 8 and 60 Turn 6. 2nd Caution on lap 11 for Contact Car 51 in Turn 2. 3rd Caution on lap 26 for Contact Cars 18 and 27 in Turn 3. 4th Caution on lap 78 for Spin Car 28 in Turn 7. 5th Caution on lap 85 for Spin Car 14 in Turn 8.
The race had 2 Lead Changes among 2 1 10 Palou, Alex, 26 6 Siegel, Nolan, 37 10 Palou, Alex, Leader Summary: 10 Palou, Alex 84, 6 Siegel, Nolan 11.
Photo Courtesy of INDYCAR
NTT INDYCAR SERIES STATEMENT:
Palou Continues Domination of Laguna Seca, Series Standings with Eighth Win of 2025
MONTEREY, Calif. (Sunday, July 27, 2025) – WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca remains Alex Palou’s best track, and the NTT INDYCAR SERIES’ champion designation almost certainly will stay with him as well.
The driver of the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda proved both with a dominating drive in the Java House Grand Prix of Monterey. In leading 84 of the 95 laps, Palou won on the California road course for the second consecutive year – again from the pole – and scored his third win here in the past four years.
Palou’s command of the sport is most evident in the season standings, where collecting the weekend’s maximum number of points, coupled with the fourth-place finish of Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward, swelled his lead to a whopping 121 points. Only three races remain.
The winner of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge still has work to do to clinch his third consecutive series championship and fourth in five years, but the effort required will be minimal. Effectively, O’Ward needs to win out for Palou to be threatened. Everyone else has been eliminated from contention.
“It’s been an awesome weekend, an awesome year (and) today was something else,” Palou said. “It’s super fun to be here – one of my favorite tracks for sure. I couldn’t be happier right now.”
This win gave Palou his eighth win in 14 races this season. Only three drivers in the sport’s history – A.J. Foyt in 1964, Al Unser in 1970 and Mario Andretti in 1969 – have won more races in a single year. Foyt and Unser hold the season record with 10 wins. Andretti had nine. Palou is one of six drivers with eight; he is the first to do so since Sebastien Bourdais in 2007.
The win also was the 19th of Palou’s still-young career – the 28-year-old Spaniard has made just 95 starts. Only 23 drivers in open-wheel racing history have been to victory lane more often, and the next race is at Portland International Raceway, a track where Palou won in 2021 and 2023.
Palou relinquished the lead on this 11-turn, 2.238-mile road course only to pit. Interestingly, the first time the driver taking the top spot was Arrow McLaren’s Nolan Siegel, who led the first 11 series laps of his career. On Palou’s second stop, Team Penske’s Will Power was briefly ahead of him, but Power pitted before he could officially lead a lap.
Palou’s margin of victory was 3.7965 seconds, but he frequently led by more than that. He lowered his average finish in five starts at this track to 1.6, the lowest of any driver in any event on the current calendar.
“It was not easy,” he said. “We had to push; we had to try to be ready for those (late caution periods). We knew that we were not on the (freshest) of tires … but luckily we had enough pace to open a small gap and get the win.”
Arrow McLaren’s Christian Lundgaard finished second with Colton Herta of Andretti Global w/ Curb-Agajanian third. The two had a memorable mid-race moment when Lundgaard muscled his way to the inside of Herta in the track’s final corner.
There were two incidents on the opening lap. First, a tussle between Conor Daly and rookie Robert Shwartzman shoved the latter into the Turn 3 gravel pit. Three corners later, Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyffin Simpson ran into the back of Felix Rosenqvist, knocking the Meyer Shank Racing w/ Curb-Agajanian driver through the gravel and against the tire barrier. Simpson ricocheted off the wall, sending his car into another part of the tires.
On Lap 11, Dale Coyne Racing rookie Jacob Abel appeared to have a mechanical failure as his car completely missed Turn 1 and sailed into the gravel. Later, Kirkwood ran into the back of Dale Coyne Racing’s Rinus VeeKay, drawing the penalty that effectively ended Kirkwood’s championship hopes.
The two late caution periods were the result of the Turn 6 off by Andretti Global’s Marcus Ericsson and AJ Foyt Racing’s Santino Ferrucci spinning at the top of the Corkscrew.
After five races over four July weekends, the series will take a short break before resuming Palou’s march to the Astor Challenge Cup. The BITNILE.com Grand Prix of Portland will be Sunday, Aug. 10 at 3 p.m. ET on FOX.
Java House Grand Prix of Monterey Race Results
WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca July 27, 2025
Position Starting Position Car Driver Laps Status
1. 1. Car 10 Palou, Alex 95 Running
2. 7. Car 7 Lundgaard, Christian 95 Running
3. 3. Car 26 Herta, Colton 95 Running
4. 2. Car 5 O’Ward, Pato 95 Running
5. 19. Car 9 Dixon, Scott 95 Running
6. 24. Car 90 Ilott, Callum 95 Running
7. 5. Car 12 Power, Will 95 Running
8. 10. Car 66 Armstrong, Marcus 95 Running
9. 11. Car 21 Rasmussen, Christian 95 Running
10. 13. Car 3 McLaughlin, Scott 95 Running
11. 4 2. Car Newgarden, Josef 95 Running
12. 8. Car 15 Rahal, Graham 95 Running
13. 6. Car 4 Malukas, David 95 Running
14. 23. Car 76 Daly, Conor 95 Running
15. 22. Car 20 Rossi, Alexander 95 Running
16. 18. Car 27 Kirkwood, Kyle 95 Running
17. 9. Car 45 Foster, Louis (R) 95 Running
18. 16. Car 6 Siegel, Nolan 95 Running
19. 26. Car 77 Robb, Sting Ray 95 Running
20. 27. Car 30 DeFrancesco, Devlin 94 Running – Canadian
21. 25. Car 83 Shwartzman, Robert (R) 94 Running
22. 20. Car 14 Ferrucci, Santino 94 Running
23. 17. Car 18 Veekay, Rinus 92 Running
24. 12. Car 60 Rosenqvist, Felix 91 Running
25. 15. Car 28 Ericsson, Marcu 78 Mechanical
26. 21. Car 51 Abel, Jacob (R) 10 Contact
27. 14. Car 8 Simpson, Kyffin 95 Contact
Race Statistics
Time of Race: 02:05:00.1159 Avg Speed: 102.051
Fastest Lap: 113.821 mph ( 70.7851 sec) on lap 9 by 10 – Alex Palou
The race had 2 Lead Changes among 2 drivers.
The race had 5 Caution for 13 Laps: 13
Next INDYCAR Event: Sunday, Aug. 10 Portland International Raceway FOX 3 p.m.
INDYCAR
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Photos & Graphics Courtesy of INDYCAR