Alex Palou speaks (a little) on what drove him back to Ganassi from McLaren: 'Things changed'

PEBBLE BEACH, California – Alex Palou revealed that midway through his IndyCar season of the ages, he began to question his original plan of leaving Chip Ganassi Racing to join Arrow McLaren.

Without a firm offer to drive in Formula One, Palou believed he could not walk away from the excellence that has been created with the No. 10 American Legion Dallara-Honda at Chip Ganassi Racing.

Beginning with the GMR Grand Prix at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on May 13 and culminating with the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio on July 2, Palou won four of five races, including three in a row counting Detroit, Road America, and Mid-Ohio.

That gave him firm control of the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series standings. The closest any driver came after that was Scott Dixon, who was 74 points entering last Sunday’s Bitnile.com Grand Prix of Portland.

It was too little, too late to contend seriously with Palou for the championship as the Spaniard clinched his second IndyCar title in three years with the race victory.

Prior to the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix at Nashville on Aug. 6, Palou asked himself — with two championships in three years and a race team firing on all cylinders — how could he leave?

“Absolutely,” Palou admitted to a small group of media at Pebble Beach Golf Course on Wednesday. “There is no hiding if you look at my interviews until 2021, I would say I was not focused on F1 at all, and that was totally true.

“But things changed when I won the championship. I was 24. I had just won my first big championship and what if I try something and it goes sideways, then I can come back when I’m 27 and still super young and can still do it for 10 or 15 years.

“Then it changed. The door opened a little bit with McLaren. It was amazing. I got to test old cars and then Practice 1 last year at COTA, and it was amazing. The opportunity was great, but there was nothing else there of ‘You will have a car.’

“Maybe if I was 20, I would have waited, but I’m not 20. I’m 26. I don’t know of anyone who waited until 30 that got into Formula One.”

In Palou’s mind, it made little sense to leave Chip Ganassi Racing to join Arrow McLaren in IndyCar. That team might one day be in a position to challenge for championships, but it has yet to win a race in 2023.

“You don’t get a lot of opportunities over there,” Palou said of Formula One. “I would not trade my seat here for anything there. I would think about it. But you don’t get a lot of chances.

“In IndyCar, there are 27 cars so that is double the cars. A lot more movement and a lot more opportunities here.”

Palou had his epiphany and changed his mind. After agreeing to join McLaren in 2024, he informed McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown that he would not make the jump.

“It was during Nashville that things started to happen, probably before,” Palou said. “But it started at Nashville.”

Brown was upset and felt betrayed. He sent a letter to both the McLaren Formula One team and the Arrow McLaren IndyCar team that Palou would not be joining the operation in 2024.

That letter went public and was first reported by Jenna Fryer of The Associated Press on Aug. 11 – the night before the Gallagher Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Palou was not shocked that Brown went public.

“No,” he said. “I was expecting that. I was expecting sooner rather than later that there was going to be some movement, for sure.

“That was at the Indy road course.”

Beyond that, Palou would not go into additional details regarding his decision. McLaren has filed a lawsuit against Palou in Commercial Court in the United Kingdom.

Because of that, Palou has been advised by his lawyers to decline comment until after the trial.

“I would love to just tell you exactly everything,” Palou said. “They said to say, ‘No comment.’ There is nothing I can say that is going to help me. Whatever I say now is not going to help me. It will help the fans a little bit and I understand.

“I understand from my side, and my family wants to know what is going on. That’s normal. If it happens to my family, I can’t imagine to everybody else.

“I don’t know what I can say that can help you.”

Palou has reunited with his agent, former IndyCar Series driver Roger Yasukawa (who helped broker the Team Goh deal that essentially brought Palou to IndyCar). He has severed ties with Monaco Increase Management (MIM), the company that put together his supposed deal with McLaren for an F1 opportunity.

Palou confirmed that he has not spoken to Zak Brown or MIM since he informed McLaren of his decision on Aug. 11.

“I cannot blame everybody for stuff that I made decisions as well,” Palou said. “It was not the right choice, that’s why I’m working with Roger Yasukawa. I knew him from Japan and told him I wanted IndyCar, and he made it happen with the team I wanted. He has always been there and helped make the jump happen from Japan to the U.S. and from Dale Coyne to Chip Ganassi.

“Roger worked for Goh and because I wanted him to be at the races for me, he never left Goh. He was working with me, we made him part of the crew.

“Last year is when I told him to step away because he had nothing to do with everything that happened. He was still coming to some races and coming with me. He was at the Indianapolis 500.”

It was on July 12, 2022 when Palou announced he had a deal with McLaren for 2023 hours after Chip Ganassi Racing told reporters the team exercised an option on the driver's contract for 2023.

That created some bitter acrimony between Palou and Ganassi’s championship-caliber team.

“In 2022, I was fighting my own team,” Palou admitted. “What was hard was it was not going on on the track. I don’t call my lawyer every day. I find out through the media.

“Honestly, I don’t have my voicemail active, so I don’t get any voicemails. I don’t answer not because I’m rude – I’m a little bit rude – but I can’t really say or comment on what is going on.

“I don’t keep track of everything because it’s not going to help me. But in 2022 it was different because I was fighting against my team and had to still work with them, and it was tough for both cars.

“This year, I’m not keeping track of this stuff.”

It appears that the relationship between Palou and Ganassi never has been better.

Did he have to take steps to repair that relationship?

“Yes and no,” Palou said. “It was always good with the 10 car. It has not been from one day or another back to normal. It’s been natural, and it’s a lot easier than it has seemed from the outside.

“Chip has never been bad with me personally. Personally, face to face, he would still treat me like, ‘Hello, good morning. Have a good race.’

“Lately, he has been very good. This year has been very good.”

After he won the championship last Sunday at Portland, Palou was not ready to reveal that he had a contract extension to remain with Chip Ganassi Racing, though it was rather obvious.

Instead, Ganassi made the confirmation to NBC’s Kevin Lee in victory lane that Palou would be back.

“Chip told me, ‘I think I said something you will get a lot of attention from,' ’” Palou said. “I was like, ‘Thanks Chip.'

“What can I say?’

Palou celebrated the championship in Portland last Sunday with his wife, Esther, and a friend from Spain.

He even enjoyed a rare drink.

“I don’t need much,” Palou said. “One beer for me, and I start to get funny.”

He honored his ailing race strategist, Chip Ganassi Racing team manager Barry Wanser, who is recovering from cancer surgery in Indianapolis.

“We FaceTimed him in Victory Lane and then he called me afterward when there was nobody,” Palou said. “He sounded better than I thought. He worked so hard all year and then he missed the fun part.”

On Thursday, Palou was back in the No. 10 American Legion Honda for a full-field test day at WeatherTech Raceway at Laguna Seca.

It’s a chance for the team to try some new things in preparation for a championship defense in 2024.

“We don’t really get test days with a lot of cars,” Palou said. “When we get a test day, it’s normally the team and a few cars, so it is not representative. We’ll try some crazy stuff you wouldn’t try on a practice. We can try that on a test day.”

Last year, Palou defeated Josef Newgarden by over 30 seconds in the Firestone Grand Prix of Monterey. Since then, the picturesque road course has been repaved, which is why IndyCar opened with a full-field test on Thursday.

“That won’t happen again with the new tire, and even with the same tarmac as last year, people figured it out so that would not happen,” Palou said of last year’s dominating margin of victory. “We get a full day of testing on Thursday so everybody will know the same. We went with one car and tested different tires.

“When I was at the test here earlier this year, the driving line was very grippy. The tarmac was very new. It’s still a tough place to pass. You have Turn 1, Turn 4 and the last corner. There are not a lot of passing zones.”

After the checkered flag drops on Sunday’s IndyCar Series finale, Palou said, “That’s when the fun will begin” and he can let loose with a proper celebration.

As for additional comments on his contract situation, that won’t be forthcoming until the case in Commercial Court in the UK is settled.

“I know that whatever I say is not going to help me,” Palou said. “It’s going to hurt me for some reason, so until it’s fully clean and everything is nice, I can’t really say anything.”

Follow Bruce Martin at @BruceMartin_500