Pato O'ward traces the P11; Palou triumph in St. Pete

The Indycar opened season with a fought race between Palou, Newgarden and Dixon

The Mexican pilot Pato O’ward started the 2025 season of Indycar With the eleventh place in the St. Petersburg Grand Prix, After tracing 12 positions.

The team’s royal Arrow McLaren He had to swim against the countercurrent, after having had a bad qualification on Saturday in the street circuit of Florida of 1.8 miles. Pato could only get into box 23 and from there he had to row in the 100 scheduled laps.

The winner was the three -time champion and reigning monarch of the category, the Spanish Alex Palouof the team IEOSIwho overcame his coequipero Scott Dixon already Josef Newgarden of Penske.

The history of the race began an early shock that caused the strategies to be altered, especially for pilots who, like O’Ward, hoped to bring the game of hard tires to a long Stint, in search of a yellow, but not so soon.

Thus, in the first curves the first yellow flag fell when Will Power touched the back of the Arrow McLaren of Nolan Siegel and ended up with the fence.

Another affected was Louis Fosterof the Rahal team, who suffered half Trompo and, although he avoided contact with them, had to leave.

Pato O’ward He had to enter Pits with a puchaura, probably caused by the remains of the cars that collided, but still could be placed in position 20.

The tip of the race kept it Scott McLaughlinfollowed by Felix Rosenqvist and Marcus Armstrongbut in the arrests in the tarry, the cars of IEOSI They would win the strategic press.

The Mexican O’Ward returned to Pits in Tour 23, which was the maximum that could carry the alternative tires. His moment came when he squeezed and took full advantage of the “push to pass” button to make clean turns to place it later.

In the 55, O’ward returned to hard black tires and entered into rhythm to get to P6 artificially, because he still lacked a detention.

Pato had a very decent step on the track, but to aspire to get to Top 10 or even Top 7, I hoped that between the laps 75 and 85 a yellow flag that could give him a stop of little loss of time could give him, but that precautionary flannel did not arrive and the Mexican had to go pits for a splash and dash and black tires.

Pato fell to the P11 behind Alex Rossiwho was his partner in Arrow McLaren and now runs for Ed Carpenter. Practically with the extinct “P2P” button he pressed Rossi and became two tenths, but one thing is to reach and another to pass.

In the end, Rossi made a heroic defense and Pato O’ward He left with 19 points in the bag and stone in the shoe to know what the season could have started better.

Go ahead, the emotion occurred when Palou led, hindered by Sting Ray Robba lapping, which allowed the attack by Newgarden, who was second and that Dixon approached.

On the last lap, Palou negotiated the pass to Robb, but Dixon hunted Newgarden to steal the second place on the podium.

The next date of the season will be in The Thermal Club, California, March 23.

GP St. Petersburg Results

1.- Alex Palou (ESP) Eager 51 pts

2.- S. dixon (nz) desire 41pts

3.- J. Newgarden (USA) Penske 36 pts

4.- S. McLaughlin (Nz) Penske 36 pts

5.- K. Kirkwood (USA) Andretti 30 pts

6.- M. Ericsson (Sue) Andretti 28 pts

7.- F. Rosenqvist (Sue) Meyer S. 26 pts

8.- C. Lundgaard (DEN) to McLaren 25 pts

9.- R. Veekay (NED) Coyne 22 pts