In His Own Words: Alex Palou On What Each Win Meant In Title Run

PORTLAND, Ore. — Alex Palou’s remarkable season has included the most victories by a driver in 18 years.

A driver earns at least 51 points for a victory. So in some ways, they all count relatively the same.

But what role did his victories (and maybe his non-victories) play into his fourth series title, clinched after 15 races of the 17-race schedule?

Palou sat down with me following his championship-clinching run Sunday at Portland International Raceway to give me almost an immediate oral history of the season’s major turning points.

Win No. 1: St. Pete (Season Opener)

Palou: That was one of the most important wins of the year. It was a place that we struggled in the past, and we knew that by pushing really hard there and trying to improve a couple of stuff that we had, we’re going to be able to fight for the win. Getting that win there just kind of allowed everybody to believe that we were a little bit better than everybody else, that we were a little bit more prepared than everybody else, and we wanted to take advantage of that and try and get more wins and try to get more good results.

Win No. 2: Thermal (Race 2)

Palou: When we went from St. Pete to Thermal, that was amazing. We had to fight for both of those races so hard, but it was amazing to get two wins in a row, which I’ve never had in my entire career at the start of the season. And it felt amazing. … It felt more like, OK we won the first two, it’s looking very good to fight for the championship again. But there’s no chance that I would have even thought about getting eight wins in one year. Like zero chance.

Win No. 3: Barber (Race 4)

Palou: It was the first weekend of May. We forget about the wins very easy. Not only us, but everybody. You have to because you cannot allow yourself to try and enjoy them. You need to keep on working towards more, because if you don’t do it, otherwise somebody else will catch you. Barber, for us, was a good way of starting the month of May, giving everybody a big boost of energy. Because the month of May, it’s very tough for everybody, especially mechanics, the engineers. They spend so many days out of home, and it felt amazing to give them that little bit of fuel that they needed to try and go for May.

Win No. 4: Indianapolis Grand Prix (Race 5)

Palou: It was a very fast race. We knew we had an amazing car there, and honestly, the pace that we had was amazing. It was just so good, we were able to manage a little bit. But, again, it kind of gave us a huge boost for the month of May. It kind of pushed us to work more and try to get the 500.

Win No. 5: Indianapolis 500 (Race 6)

Palou: The 500 is a completely different race. You spend so much time there and you know it’s so hard that even though you won the week before or the two weeks before, it just doesn’t feel like you can carry that momentum. It’s like everybody starts from zero. The 500, it’s always separate. Even if you’ve won zero or five races before that, you don’t care. You just want to go there and you want to win. And that’s the way we felt this year. Winning the 500 is super special. It’s amazing. It puts yourself in a very cool group of other drivers. But our season is so long, you cannot rely only on one race [to make your season]. What I like is going to every single weekend, fighting for the wins, getting wins, getting good results. So I don’t think I would have been happy struggling for six months and only being happy one week. That [first oval win] kind of allowed me to believe that I could win on ovals, that I had everything I needed to win more on other ovals. It kind of allowed me to have even more confidence in myself and the team. It’s just like every single race that we did this year, it kind of gave us more confidence.

Win No. 6: Road America (Race 9)

Palou: (In this race, Palou argued with his strategist over what to do). We always have those talks. Even today here at Portland, there was a strategy that was we could have done the other thing and just follow everybody else. But it’s fun. It’s what keeps this thing interesting. It’s what keeps our relationship so good. But Road America, again, was a high boost of confidence of how good we were on road courses this year and another win to add to the amazing, magical season.

Win No. 7: Iowa (Race 12)

Palou: I needed that. I needed that very badly. I wanted that. I didn’t need to. I wanted it. The fact that we won at the 500 felt amazing and that we could take the oval win, but I think it’s a very different oval compared to St. Louis, Milwaukee, Iowa. So for me, it was very important to get that Iowa win. I felt super happy to get that win. It counted even more than just one.

Win No. 8: Laguna Seca (Race 14)

Palou: It just put us in the position to get the win [of the title] here at Portland. But at the same time, the pace that we showed there was so good, it was so big, and kind of allowed us to believe everything that we’ve done this year. It gave us more confidence to try and win another race and try and go for 10 wins.

Clinching Race: Portland (Race 15, third)

Palou: We could have been in a really bad spot with our strategy. We had to overtake a lot of cars on track, and we had to recover [from falling behind by] 20 seconds that both [Will] Power and [Christian] Lundgaard gave us. We recovered that and then we fought for second as hard as I could — twice — and it didn’t work. It’s still another podium from starting fifth and not having cautions for us. It kind of hurt us a little bit. So to get another podium is amazing.

The Non-Wins

Palou: Finishing second in Long Beach [in the third race], it helped us quite a lot. Mid-Ohio, although it could have been another win and I made a mistake, I think that helped me a lot to not get relaxed at all and go down one level of confidence. Although I’m very confident, to know that you make mistakes, and that everybody’s there waiting for you to make a mistake. For sure, that’s going to make me a lot tougher. It made me tougher, but I’m sure in the long run, it’s going to be good.

Finally, Are A Record-Tying 10 Wins Possible (winning Milwaukee and Nashville)

Palou: By numbers, yes. But it’s no. Realistically, no.

Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR and INDYCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.