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Fantastic Five of 2025: BITNILE.COM Grand Prix of Portland

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Note: This is the fourth of a five-part series looking back at the five best races of the 2025 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season – in chronological order – as judged by INDYCAR.com staff writers Curt Cavin, Eric Smith and Paul Kelly, including the writers’ analysis of why those events were great. Installments will appear on Fridays through October.

THE RACE

Race: BITNILE.COM Grand Prix of Portland presented by askROI
Site: Portland International Raceway (road course)
Date: Sunday, Aug. 10
Winner: Will Power
NTT P1 Award winner: Christian Lundgaard

Will Power staked his claim to continue with Team Penske while Alex Palou secured his spot among the legends of the INDYCAR SERIES after a scintillating BITNILE.COM Grand Prix of Portland presented by askROI at Portland International Raceway.

Power earned his first victory of the season and the first this year for Team Penske – helping the legendary team avoid its first winless season since 1999 – in the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet. Power, who was unsigned by Team Penske for next season, finished 1.5388 seconds ahead of NTT P1 Award winner Christian Lundgaard in the No. 7 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet. It was the 45th victory of Power’s legendary INDYCAR SERIES career.

SEE: Race Results

Palou finished third in the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda to clinch his fourth NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship and third straight series title, joining Ted Horn (1946-48), Sebastien Bourdais (2004-07) and Dario Franchitti (2009-11) as the only drivers to achieve a three-peat. Palou's fourth Astor Challenge Cup in the last five seasons tied him with Mario Andretti, Bourdais and Franchitti for third on the all-time championship list, behind only A.J. Foyt (seven) and Scott Dixon (six).

It also was the 17th series championship for Chip Ganassi Racing, tying it with Team Penske for the most titles in INDYCAR SERIES history.

Graham Rahal finished a season-best fourth in the No. 15 Hendrickson International Honda of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, while Alexander Rossi rounded out the top five also with a season-best result in the No. 20 Java House ECR Chevrolet.

A race of divergent tire strategies in the first half converged into a spellbinding tussle between Power, Lundgaard and Palou over the last 30 laps after all three drivers made their final pit stops.

Power started the 110-lap race from the third starting spot on Firestone Firehawk alternate tires, while pole winner Lundgaard began in seventh – on Firestone primary tires – due to a six-grid spot penalty for an unapproved engine change. Palou also started on the harder, more durable Firestone primary tires from fifth on the grid.

Two-time series champion Power and Team Penske opted to use the softer, more grippy but less durable Firestone alternate tires for his first two fuel stints, choosing to try to run away from the 27-car field and hide before needing to run the primary tire – as required by series rules -- and a used set of alternate tires to finish the race.

Will Power

The strategy helped Power (photo, above) build a 20-second lead over Palou by Lap 51. But then Power pitted at the end of Lap 61 for the slower primary tires, and the chase was on for Lundgaard and Palou.

By Lap 74, Lundgaard had closed to within 1.1 seconds of Power. Palou was nine seconds back but fortified with nearly double the amount of Push to Pass overtake time as his two rivals up the track.

Lundgaard made his final stop at the end of Lap 79, taking on a fresh set of Firestone alternate tires. Power stopped for the last time a lap later, with used Firestone alternates fastened to his wheels. Palou made his final stop at the end of Lap 82, taking on fresh Firestone alternate tires like Lundgaard.

Rahal, on an alternate tire strategy, pitted from the lead at the end of Lap 84. That put Power, Lundgaard and Palou in the top three spots.

It was go time. Game on.

By Lap 96, just .851 of a second separated the top three as cars on the tail end of the lead lap created speed-sapping turbulence for leader Power. Palou briefly passed Lundgaard for second on Lap 97, but the Dane fought back to regain the spot quickly on the same lap.

On Lap 107, Palou went off course and into the grass surrounding the 12-turn, 1.964-mile circuit while trying again to pass Lundgaard for second and perhaps make a run at Power. That dustup let Power pull away, and he led by 1.8018 seconds after Lap 108 and maintained a gap to the checkered flag.

WHY IT WAS GREAT

Curt Cavin: This might come as a surprise, but Portland International Raceway is usually my favorite road course event of an INDYCAR season. Less than 2 miles in distance, I often think of the track as a short oval with left and right corners. Our cars zip around it in less than a minute, and I count five of the 12 turns as hot spots. The backstretch is sneaky fast, a stretch of high-speed road course action second only to Road America’s backstretch run through the woods. Again this year, the dangers of Portland’s backstretch were evident as contact between Conor Daly and Christian Rasmussen sent Daly into a frightening slide to the tire barrier at Turn 11. That was just one of many memorable moments in this year’s race, and I’d challenge you to consider how many such moments INDYCAR has had at PIR over the years. Trust me, it’s a lot, which is why I always look forward to races there.

Eric Smith: My Portland takeaways came from what transpired at the beginning and end of the race weekend. It started on Friday, as I was walking into the media center and spotted Josef Newgarden and David Malukas filming something together. It looked like “Bus Bros”-style content – and, as it turns out, their first video series together just dropped on YouTube last week, featuring an episode filmed in Portland. The irony? Will Power won that race, and both he and Jonathan Diuguid were asked in the post-race press conference about Power’s future with Team Penske. Their answers were rather telling. A month later, Power left the team, and Malukas was announced as his replacement. In between all that, there was a practice feud between Scott McLaughlin and Devlin DeFrancesco, an in-race spat between Conor Daly and Christian Rasmussen, in-race wheel-to-wheel battles galore, and a champion crowned.

Paul Kelly: Portland was the best race of the season. First, Will Power made a statement to Team Penske, with which he was not under contract for 2026, by earning the team’s first victory of the season with a masterful drive. Power’s response to a reporter’s question about his future status with Penske in the post-race press conference was classic Willy P – defiant, proud, pointed and true, spiced with a wee bit of profanity. One of his more defiant, funny moments since the infamous “double bird” to Race Control in 2011 at New Hampshire. But the real reason this race was amazing was the intensity of the closing laps. In a race of differing tire strategies, Power hung on just long enough to hold off NTT P1 Award Christian Lundgaard of Arrow McLaren, who started seventh due to an unapproved engine change. Alex Palou (photo, below) charged from 20 seconds back just before halfway to join Power and Lundgaard near the front when he could have just cruised to earn his fourth season title. El Campeon pushed so hard he went off track with three laps left and nearly threw away a podium finish, but in a poor attempt at a rhyme, Alex Palou doesn’t know slow. Combine the off-track drama with Power and Team Penske and a sizzling three-way fight for the win among elite drivers, and it was a race to remember.

Alex Palou