Kyle Kirkwood on his way to his second Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach victory. (Photo: The Podium Finish | Christopher Vargas)
LONG BEACH, Calif. – Coming into Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach weekend, Alex Palou and his No. 10 DHL Honda Chip Ganassi team has dominated storylines by starting the season two-for-two in St. Petersburg and Thermal and was certainly an early favorite coming into the race weekend in Southern California.
Leading up to Sunday’s race, Kyle Kirkwood was no worse than fifth in the two practice sessions and captured the NTT P1 Pole Award on Saturday. Looking to replicate what he did in 2023 by winning the pole position and the race, Kirkwood was on a mission to repeat that feat. Consider Sunday’s race mission complete.
Kirkwood’s second Long Beach victory in three years didn’t come easy for the Jupiter, Florida native.
Right out of the gate, the race was a tale of two strategies. There were drivers starting the race on the harder Firestone Firehawk primary tires like Christian Lundgaard, Scott Dixon, Kyffin Simpson, Sting Ray Robb, Robert Schwartzman and Santino Ferrucci versus the rest of the field who started on the softer Firestone Firehawk alternate tire compound.
After two laps, Josef Newgarden in the No. 2 Astemo Team Penske Chevrolet was the first to make the quick stint and came to pit road to switch to the more durable primary compound. The remaining of the field on the alternate compound soon followed, including Palou on lap 6 and Kirkwood on lap 7.
On his final pit stop of the race with 25 laps to go, Kirkwood re-entered the race with Palou right on his gearbox as they entered the fountain turn. Having more than double the amount of push-to-pass than Palou, Kirkwood was able to use that to his advantage by stretching a three-second lead over Palou with 10 laps to go. It was smooth sailing from there.
Kirkwood, leading 46 of 90 laps in a strategy-filled caution free race, drove to his second career victory at the infamous 1.968-mile, 11-turn street circuit. The race marked only the second time since 1970 that the NTT IndyCar Series opened the season with 1 caution flag in the first three races of a season, and the first time since 2016 that the Grand Prix of Long Beach went caution-free.
“He [Palou] didn’t make it easy on us,” Kirkwood told FOX Sports. “Hats off to the PreFab Honda today. What a great day. We controlled the race from practice, right? We felt like we were in control, really good qualifying, amazing race, amazing strategy. It was just execution across the board that won us that race.”
Alex Palou drove to a second place finish in the 2025 Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach. (Photo: The Podium Finish | Owen Jackson)
Palou entered Sundays Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach with a 39-point advantage over second place Pato O’Ward. After his second-place finish that gap was only reduced to a 34-point advantage over new second place driver, Kirkwood, who jumped from sixth to second in the standings after his win this Sunday.
“You never feel amazing when you finish second,” Palou told FOX Sports. “Honestly, the 27 car and Kyle, they were amazing all weekend, super fast. I tried my chances, but we couldn’t really make it work. I had a really bad start on my side, and that kind of put us on the back foot. But we did the best we could. Amazing to be here second, but hopefully next year we can just improve one step.”
Lundgaard finished third in the No. 7 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet after passing Felix Rosenqvist‘s No. 60 SiriusXM Honda of Meyer Shank Racing as they entered turn 1 with just a handful of laps remaining, with both drivers push-to-pass dwindling down to zero.
“This one’s dedicated to the crew,” said Lundgaard. “I think everybody on the No. 7 Velo Arrow McLaren Chevrolet got to rebuild the car yesterday. This is to them; this is to Jon Edward who unfortunately passed away who was close to Kyle Larson who will join us for the month of May.”
Lundgaard lead 26 of the 90 laps – second to Kirkwood. After choosing the less-popular tire strategy, Lundgaard and his Arrow McLaren team improved nine positions from his 12th starting spot to earn his second podium finish of 2025 and improving to third in the championship standings, 46-points behind Palou.
Running on the same strategy as Lundgaard, Ferrucci was the biggest mover of the race, by improving 16 positions from his 27th starting position, to finish in the 11th spot.
Next up for the NTT IndyCar Series is the Children’s of Alabama Indy Grand Prix on Sunday, May 4 at the Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Alabama, and will air at 1:30 p.m. ET on FOX.
