ELKHART LAKE, Wis.– On lap 1 of Sunday’s (June 22) XPEL Grand Prix at Road America, David Malukas went from his seventh-place starting position to last in the ninth NTT IndyCar Series race of the 2025 season.
By the end of the race’s 55th and final lap, Malukas was back where he started, but nearly 22 seconds behind race winner Alex Palou.
Even Malukas couldn’t believe it.
“I’m super surprised,” Malukas said. “Honestly, I think it was a little bit past halfway and I’m looking at the cars around me. And I’m looking and I’m talking to engineer and strategist and they say, ‘Yeah, we’re actually on par with pit stops with everybody.’ I’m like, we’re P9, Josef in front, Palou behind, I’m like, ‘What the hell is going on?’ I’m like, ‘How does this even happen?’ I mean, what a race.”
As the field went to turn 3 on the race’s opening lap, Malukas was behind Christian Lundgaard but braked a bit too late. That caused the No. 4 A. J. Foyt Racing Chevrolet to have light contact with Lundgaard’s car and spin into the gravel trap.
The AMR Safety Team got the Chicago native out of the gravel trap quickly enough that he remained on the lead lap of the race.
“So we did a different trim level for the race and the braking performance just plummeted,” Malukas said. [It] was the right call just because you can make passes very well, but definitely caught me off guard. I was really surprised that the brake just locked up and then that whole first set, we literally had to box and it kind of ended up working out. But we had to box because I just shot those tires because after that I kept locking up, locking up.
“Even the next set we put on, I’m still locking up trying to figure out my new brake points, so it really caught me off guard. So that’s a lesson learned from my side for future races, but other than that, thankfully things still worked out.”
After stopping under the race’s first two full-course yellows, Malukas was last of every car on track. When Sting Ray Robb hit the wall to the right of turn 5, Malukas stayed out of the pits while the vast majority of the rest of the field pitted.
That vaulted Malukas up to sixth, which became fifth on the ensuing restart as Malukas got by Jacob Abel. Malukas was then slightly involved with the race’s following caution as Conor Daly outbraked himself going to turn 5 and ended up in the gravel trap.
Malukas had the good fortune of pitting the lap before Daly made his lunge and was able to stay on track as a large portion of the field pitted under that full-course yellow. However, Malukas made his penultimate pit stop under the following caution when Josef Newgarden spun and hit the tire barrier exiting turn 14, setting himself up for a 23-lap run to the finish with only one more pit stop left to perform.
After making that final stop on lap 44, Malukas dropped to 10th, which became ninth after getting around Scott McLaughlin on lap 46. He gained two more spots when Alexander Rossi and Scott Dixon pitted.
Road America was not spared from the massive heat wave that has struck the majority of the U.S. this weekend. The team decided not to run a cool suit for Malukas because there were difficulties getting it to operate. That didn’t make his day any easier in temperatures that peaked near 95 degrees Fahrenheit near race’s end.
“Oh man, that was actually horrendous,” Malukas said. “Man, it was so hot. I think it was about 35 laps in when I was like, like squinting my eyes, you know, focus on what’s in front of me. I’m like, I don’t even know what the car is, it’s like there’s like seven front, rear wings.
“I’m like hallucinating over here. I thought I was seeing bears and things. I would get real, real, real dehydrated. So as soon as we came in, I was launching everything out there, everybody was like, ‘Hey, good recovery,’ I’m like, ‘Get me out! Get me out! I need water!’ So yeah, tough race.”
The recovery was a good comeback after what was supposed to be a great result at World Wide Technology Raceway last weekend. Malukas had started fourth but finished 12th at one of his best tracks after late wall contact knocked him out of contention.
Christopher DeHarde has covered IndyCar racing and the Road to Indy for various outlets since 2014. In addition to open wheel racing, DeHarde has also covered IMSA and various short track racing events around Indiana. Originally from New Orleans, DeHarde moved to the Indianapolis area in 2017 to further pursue a career as a motorsports writer.