IndyCar returned to the streets of Long Beach last weekend for the fifth race of the 2026 season. One of the classic venues on the IndyCar calendar with a history going back over half a century, it’s one of the most desirable locations for a driver to win a Grand Prix. Qualifying threw up a few surprises and when it came down to the main event, it was a straight up battle of endurance between the entire field with Palou and Rosenqvist fighting one another out in front for the victory. As ever though, there can only be one winner.
Here are The Paddock Chronicle’s Key Takeaways from Long Beach.
Alex Palou – Back on Top
Long Beach was one of the few places that Alex Palou had yet to secure a win prior to last weekend. That has now been rectified as the defending Champion notched up yet another win to his name. After qualifying in third place, Palou dispatched O’Ward with ease in the opening metres of the race. He then sat patiently in second place for the duration of the Grand Prix, biding his time behind pole sitter and race leader Felix Rosenqvist. Just two points away from leading the Championship ahead of Long Beach and ahead of his main rival, Kyle Kirkwood at that point in the race, second place would have been good enough for Palou.
But when Palou and the Chip Ganassi outfit are presented with an opportunity, they don’t need to be asked twice to take it. Jumping ahead of Rosenqvist in the pit cycle gave Palou the lead and from there, the Spaniard was able to open up a gap of just over four seconds from the Swede. Rosenqvist simply couldn’t get close enough again to attempt an overtake and so Palou took his third win of the season.
Palou leaves Long Beach with a seventeen point lead over Kirkwood, who himself finished in fourth place. Sixty-three points (over an entire race win) already sits between Palou and third place man David Malukas. Both of these drivers, and the other sitting in the top ten overall, will need to have some almighty performances soon if they want to stop Palou from running away with the Championship lead as he attempts to win his fifth title in six years.
Felix Rosenqvist – Close but No Cigar
With one IndyCar victory to his name, Felix Rosenqvist is viewed by many as a underrated driver packed with potential and simply lacking in the opportunities to demonstrate what he’s truly capable of. His pole position in Long Beach last week was a welcome twist in the tale of the 2026 season and for the majority of the race, we looked set to have a second race weekend in a row with a feel good narrative.
Running out in front from the start of the race, Rosenqvist’s hard work came undone in the pit cycle where he was pipped narrowly by Palou who used this chance to steal the win away from him. Clean air is king at Long Beach and Felix, try as he might, just couldn’t get close enough to Palou to get back past him. In the end, he had to settle for second place – his best result since Road America last season. He’s achieved a single podium in each season since 2020, barring 2021, and will surely be hoping that in 2026, it will be different.
With this being his best result at Long Beach ever and with Meyer Shank’s quiet rise over the last season and a bit, the signs look good for Rosenqvist to be on a path of ascension. But losing the victory so close to the end is still surely going to sting. With a history of strong results at Sonsio, IndyCar’s next stop on the calendar, Felix will be hoping that he can carry this positive momentum forwards and potentially return to the top of the podium there instead.
Return of the Iceman
Despite finishing three of the last four races inside the top ten, it hasn’t felt like quite the start to the season that Scott Dixon will have wanted. Poor performances in qualifying have hindered his ultimate result when it comes to the Grand Prix. But it appeared to fifth time’s the charm for the recently knighted New Zealander.
Having snuck into the top six during qualifying, the Iceman then made his way up to third place by the end of the Grand Prix at Long Beach and claimed his first podium of the season – his most recent podium appearance prior was back in Iowa last year. Eighty-five points away from Palou in the Championship, you’d still be silly to write Dixon off this early on in the year. Third to thirteenth in the points standings is an incredibly tight affair and one bad result – or one very good one – can swing the pendulum massively. If anyone could do it and still enter the conversation for what would be a seventh driver’s title, it would be Scott Dixon.
No Luck for Newgarden
The 2026 Long Beach Grand Prix wasn’t a classic – but it wasn’t from a lack of trying, at least when it came to Josef Newgarden. Qualifying down in fourteenth place, the Team Penske driver could afford to roll the dice in order to improve his fortunes. This he did with an early pit stop that meant he’d need to find forty seconds of time across the race in order to hold onto the gains he was likely to make as a result. At one point, he was over a second a lap quicker than every other driver in the field.
But a caution, the first at Long Beach since 2024, undid the groundwork that Newgarden had laid down and he ultimately finished exactly where he’d started – in fourteenth place. The silver lining is that he didn’t lose any places from taking this risk. Had the strategy worked, we might all now be calling the 2026 Long Beach Grand Prix a classic. Alas, it was not to be. Better luck next time Josef.
Thin Ice for Siegel
When you’re racing for Arrow McLaren and both Pato O’Ward and Christian Lundgaard are your teammates, there’s naturally going to be a lot of pressure on your shoulders. Factor in that your boss, Tony Kanaan, has said publicly that you need to finish inside the top ten overall in the standings at the end of the season to keep your seat at the team and that pressure goes up a notch. That’s the position that Nolan Siegel finds himself in.
With only three top ten results in his entire IndyCar career to date, Nolan Siegel needed a good weekend in Long Beach. In the end, it was a mixed bag. On the one hand, he finished in twelfth – his best result of the season so far and his best result since Mid-Ohio last year. On the other hand, he crashed in qualifying and started Sunday’s race from last place. He did manage to carve his way through the field but when your teammate sit fourth and fifth in the standings and you’re in twenty third, it’s simply not enough.
Long Beach was a step in the right direction for Siegel. But it’s a make or break year for the American and if he doesn’t raise his game consistently soon, we may be looking at a new driver joining Arrow McLaren in 2027.
Potential for Power
Starting from seventh on the grid in Long Beach, Will Power looked set to take advantage where he could during Sunday’s race with strategy and endurance the two major factors at play during the Grand Prix.
But an unfortunate incident in pitlane proved to be Power’s undoing. Owing to the narrow nature of the pitlane in Long Beach and that almost every car pitted at the same time, Power ended up making contact with one of the team members of Caio Collet’s pit crew. Thankfully the crew member wasn’t seriously injured but it did result in Power receiving a penalty and finishing down in nineteenth place. When Will Power isn’t busy having bad luck this season, it appears that he simply has no luck at all.
The potential is there for Power and we’ve seen glimpses of it already this season with both Phoenix and Arlington as prime examples of this. But the Australian needs a string of solid results combined with a clean weekend in the very near future if he wants to cling on to any hope of making his first season with Andretti Global a good one.
The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
Elsewhere at Long Beach, there were many tales of mixed fortunes. After his podium last time out in Barber, Graham Rahal had another solid result as he finished in seventh place. Could this be the start of a renaissance for the veteran driver? Alexander Rossi also had a great day at the office for ECR, finishing in ninth place after starting down in eighteenth. The same couldn’t be said for his teammate though, Christian Rasmussen, who found himself battling for fifteenth place.
Marcus Armstrong also had a weekend to forget. The Meyer Shank driver finished down in twenty fourth place – his worst finish this season by a country mile. The last time he had a finishing result this bad was back in 2023. Scott McLaughlin meanwhile had a good, if anonymous race. Sixth place for him was a welcome result after his massive crash in Barber. Teammate David Malukas finished in seventh in what was a good outing overall for Team Penske.
Mick Schumacher’s bad luck continued to make itself known as the German driver struggled through practice and qualifying, both due to technical issues with the car and incidents on track. He started twenty first and finished in seventeenth place – so there was at least one positive to take from the weekend in terms of his progress up the order. Kyffin Simpson put in an excellent showing in Long Beach however, finishing in tenth place, having started in ninth. The Cayman driver needed a result like this after a mixed start to the season.
What’s Next?
IndyCar next heads to Indianapolis to race on the road course there ahead of the 110th running of the Indy 500. Palou has a strong history there, having won the last three races at the venue. Graham Rahal too has a solid history at Sonsio and will be hoping to keep that streak alive. With Kirkwood now slightly on the backfoot, he’ll need a strong outing to keep himself in the game and ahead of those who’d love to take the fight to Palou instead.
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IndyCar Returns May 9th at the Indianapolis Road Course
Feature Image: Joe Skibinski – IndyCar Media Centre