“Rassle, Dazzle.”
And for Part 2 of this weekend’s DRR Double Header, Round 16 and the penultimate race of the 2025 IndyCar Season, with the travelling circus heading back to Milwaukee and its famous Mile, the oldest race track in the United States. And we got a pretty tame race with a freakish, explosive ending, and a brand new winner in the series. Let’s get into it.
The Point Of Difference
I’ll cut to the chase on this one. This was a race that took about 220 laps to get out of the 250. Alex Palou shocked everyone by qualifying on pole by three quarters of a mile per hour to deny David Malukas pole position. And we got two early cautions – Nolan Siegel spun out on the low line and crashed on the opening lap, followed by Graham Rahal nearly spinning but saving the car on the exit of Turn 2 in the aftermath. Malukas overtook Palou early on and led for 25 laps, but Malukas couldn’t handle the first wave of lapped traffic and Palou took the lead back.
From there, and I cannot stress this enough – Alex Palou beat the field’s ass for the vast majority of the race. Palou led 199 laps and comfortably looked like the fastest man on track. The difference maker for him, was that he was brilliant at handling the traffic that the mile inevitably spits out given it’s only a 25-second lap.
Every time Palou got to the back of a pack, he found a way to set up passes into either turn, and generate gaps and space between himself and the opposition. Malukas and McLaughlin, his main opposition, didn’t have an answer for the traffic, and at times, were losing multiple tenths per lap being stuck. The only reason the field bunched back up at times, was because this time, the Undercut was the preferred strategy of choice and was worth several seconds per lap, and Palou was always last in of the leaders for what ultimately became a 4-stop race.
Palou had it in the bag, until a sudden caution with 42 laps to go. Why? RAIN. In Milwaukee. In August. 70 degree weather. It was a 10-minute rain shower that added 13 laps of caution to the docket. With it, three quarters of the field came in with 35 to go for fresh fuel and tires, except for the Top 3 runners of Palou, McLaughlin and Newgarden. The tire delta was 17 laps.
Enter the hero of the story, Christian Rasmussen. With 30 laps to go, he went on a rampage, tearing through the field on his fresher rubber, and he was the only man to make it work, as other strong oval runners like Pato O’Ward and Alex Rossi, both on the same strategy as Rasmussen, couldn’t gain ground.
Rasmussen ate Palou alive despite being two seconds back in a matter of laps, passed him for the lead, and didn’t look back. Don’t get it twisted, he drove the final 10 laps like a maniac. You could see he was fighting his car at every opportunity, but he found a way to make it work. How? An almost stupid level of confidence in himself, his car, and the high line. He’d been pounding it at Milwaukee all race and weekend long. It was his point of difference that ultimately made the difference in the clutch when it mattered most. Even if he almost pinned himself in the wall trying to outside of Louis Foster with 10 laps left.
It’s the first win for ECR in nearly a decade – Josef Newgarden’s Iowa win in 2016 was the last time Carpenter had tasted the winner’s circle, and his team needed it given the big Splenda rebranding and co-ownership plan until now… looked like a bit of a damp squib. ECR’s come on strong late with Rossi scoring back-to-back Top 5’s and now Rasmussen’s win. But they’re still sitting roughly where they’ve always been – 12th and 14th in points at time of writing. For a team that raised a good $40m in extra funding, those aren’t great optics.
But honestly… when you win your first IndyCar in nine years, with that kind of finish to the man who’s crushed the field in 2025, who fucking cares? And on top of that, the flukey nature of rainfall is something I can cancel out by the point tables. If we scored the season ONLY on Ovals, look here:
Alex Palou – 198 (Average Finish – 3.4)
Pato O’Ward – 185 (Average Finish – 3.2)
Christian Rasmussen – 166 (Average Finish – 4.8)
Rasmussen’s only behind the best oval racer in the series, and the dominant series champion who was good at ovals, but became GREAT at them in 2025. That’s a huge, shocking, brilliant outlier for his 2025. Christian has finished every oval race in the Top 10 this season1, it’s a superb achievement. It’s the sort of performance that defines you, that people will remember you by. Yeah, it was a little lucky given the circumstances, but they all count on the Wikipedia page.
Not bad for a man we were calling to be banned just a fortnight ago. Wouldn’t want to be in Conor Daly’s camp right about now, phew…
The Lightning Round
To the person on Bluesky who said that Christian Rasmussen is what Townsend Bell thinks Santino Ferrucci is, chefs kiss.
I’m going to be that guy again – the broadcast. They’re just not good enough, man. The booth has its flaws (Townsend), but it’s mostly fine. But there’s some clear disconnects between the box and the production truck. Multiple times, key passes and action was missed, and the commentators were talking about them and just not seeing it.
We’re watching a Palou/McLaughlin pitlane battle and Buxton’s talking about Newgarden and his “strap-on” Chevy. We’re still getting timing tower glitches and errors and we’re nearly a full season down. We got a first time winner and the broadcast was over five minutes after the winner crossed the line2, and we got no podium ceremony. And sadly, no mention of it being the 10th Anniversary of the tragic passing of Justin Wilson3. It feels immensely frustrating to point this out week on week in IndyCar to the point where I find listening to FOX a chore, even though the broadcast is 90% the same as to what it was last year. Gah.
That was Scott McLaughlin’s first podium since Barber on May 4th. And it now means, at least one of either him, and/or former Bus Bro Josef Newgarden is going winless in 2025. Yeesh.
Also, Christian Rasmussen won on a short oval before David Malukas did. Am I high?
Congratulations to Dennis Hauger for finishing second in the Indy NXT race and sealing the title. A fresh start and environment was exactly what he needed. Just one question – How does he make the 2026 grid? Jacob Abel is paying for the #51, McLaren and RLL are seemingly locked in for next year… does Andretti give Juncos a cheque for Daly’s ride given Sting Ray Robb’s paying big money for his? Personally, I wonder what Marcus Ericsson’s value is to Andretti at this point, but what do I know…
Marshall Pruett reported this weekend that Prema is in big trouble, with rumours that new funding is needed for 2026. I did always ponder how sustainable the team was going to be with no charters or Leader’s Circle payouts, and it seems we’re now finding out. For those unaware, Debroah Mayer of Iron Dames Endurance fame is their main backer, co-owner of billion dollar company DC Racing Solutions, and she’s put in $40m to make this work. But what’s the point if you’re considering pulling the plug after just a year?!
Also, read this quote from HRC USA President David Salters after Honda won the IndyCar Manufacturers title two rounds early:
“We love IndyCar. We’ve been here for 30 years I believe doing pretty well and very well this year. We love IndyCar. We love the racing. We don’t talk about our private businesses. We love IndyCar. We love what we’re doing, but we don’t discuss, we look at where we’re going for the future, but that’s a Honda thing. We don’t really discuss our private businesses in public.”
Does that sound like a company that’s sticking around? Not exactly a vote of confidence, even if Salters sounds like he wrote his speech on ChatGPT.
And seeing McLaren’s latest court documents in the Alex Palou lawsuit, seeing Theo Pourchaire was only paid $87,500 for five races, and being a team reserve for the rest of the year is really, really depressing. I know journos at my old firm that were getting more than that. Goes to show you that Theo was broke, broke in 2024. And when it’s public knowledge that Nolan Siegel was prepared to pay $1.25m for 10 races to replace him, it was a no-brainer for McLaren to make the move they did. Just one problem… Siegel really isn’t doing much to dispel the “pay driver” moniker we like to hit folks with. 22nd in points this season is just bad. Hope his 2026 is better, and you feel like it has to be.
The Verdict: 6.5/10 (Decent) – An okay race, with an electric finish. It felt a little dirty given the circumstances, but I can’t deny, Rasmussen’s charge was the exact finish that the series needed to push home how good the ovals can be. A necessary evil, like team orders, and TNT Sport glazing Jake Dixon. See you in Nashville for the season finale.
- The three men on the list are also the only three to have done that in 2025. ↩︎
- The featured picture of this very article was posted on Instagram, after the race was already off the air. ↩︎
- Given this weekend Marshall Pruett also announced that there’s a docuseries on Wilson in the making, it doubly feels like a missed opportunity given how tight knit IndyCar’s family feels. ↩︎
