DETROIT – A week after the 110th running of the Indianapolis 500, the NTT IndyCar Series rolled into the Motor City for the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix. Championship leader Alex Palou expanded his lead at the top of the points by winning the event, while Kyle Kirkwood passed David Malukas in points as a result of his second-place finish. Graham Rahal rounded out the podium, finishing third.
The streets of Detroit lived up to their reputation for chaos in a race that saw six cautions and six different leaders. One of the most noteworthy incidents throughout the event occurred between former Team Penske teammates Scott McLaughlin and Will Power, who were battling for the final podium position with less than 25 laps to go. Coming out of turn 3, McLaughlin ran wide on exit and forced Power’s Andretti Global Honda into the outside barrier. The resulting contact sent Power’s Andretti Global Honda into the air and ultimately caused damage that ended his race.
This incident came after Power ran McLaughlin wide in turn 4 in the first half of the race, nearly causing McLaughlin to crash into the barrier. A few laps later, Power forced McLaughlin wide again, this time out of turn 3.
“I’ve got so much respect for Will Power, he’s been my teammate for so many years,” McLaughlin said. “Today I just felt like he gave me no option.”
Power and McLauglin were teammates at Team Penske for five seasons, spanning from 2021 to 2025.
After the race, McLaughlin said his car was “probably good enough for third or fourth.” He had been running near the podium places for most of the race after qualifying third. On the contact, McLaughlin said he was side by side with Power coming out of turn 3, when he got sideways and ran closer to his former teammate than intended.
“We were side-by-side out of turn 3 and I got a little sideways, which made me press him to the wall a lot more aggressively than I wanted,” McLaughlin said.
“I don’t know whether he’s pissed off because of that. I’m not sure, but then after that, he got me, and I was pretty happy with it. I was like, ‘still good, good result right now, he’s faster than me on restart, so I’ll let him have it.’ And then, going to [turn] 3, he locked the right-front, I got up the inside of him, and honestly, I was just going to go to the outside, and he just kept, kept turning in and just basically gave me no option.
“So the whole way, no option. I went beside him, no option, [he] just turned on the inside of me and drove me into the right side fence and another fence. I didn’t want to do that to him, I didn’t want to do that to my day.”
With 10 laps to go. McLaughlin was forced to pit due to a rear toe link issue that was related to the contact with Power’s car. Overall, this contact relegated him from running inside the top five for most of the day to finishing the race in 19th. Power meanwhile retired from the race and finished 22nd after leading 18 laps.
“I really didn’t want to see that happen for either of us,” McLaughlin said on the incident as a whole. “I don’t know what else I could have done.”
Frontstretch was unable to reach Will Power for comment after the race.
Looking ahead to the remainder of the season, McLaughlin said he had a great car and a great feeling on the street circuit in Detroit.
“We had a great weekend, to be honest, outside of this. We got a feeling, and we’ll see how we go.”
Looking ahead to Gateway, McLaughlin can take confidence from the fact that he had a fast car in St Louis last year. Leading 51 laps and running close to the front for a majority of the race before a mechanical failure resulted in a 24th-place finish. McLaughlin also has two career wins on ovals, both coming in 2024 at Iowa Speedway and Milwaukee Mile.
