Speaking with Motorsport.com’s Matt Weaver, Alex Palou offered a candid look into his incredible career as an IndyCar driver. In 2025, he earned his fourth IndyCar title in the last five years, and became an Indy 500 legend.
Palou discussed a variety of topics throughout the 15-minute interview, including when he chose to become a race car driver, his first crash, overcoming a fear of ovals, and becoming one of the sport’s greatest drivers.
At one point, he credited his time in Super Formula as one of the main factors behind his current skill-level. He spent the 2019 season there, winning at Fuji and ending the year third in the championship standings.
“There’s really high-grip tracks, super technical, no runoff areas, and all the Japanese drivers — they only have those seven, eight tracks, so they know those tracks amazingly,” said Palou. “They know every bump, they know how the track evolves. They know so much, the level they compete at is 100% since practice. The car is one of those cars that has so much downforce, no weight, a lot of power … I’m really confident that I wouldn’t be as fast or as confident as I am today without racing in Super Formula.”
And despite his dominance, he is always pushing to find a new limit, and gaining a greater edge over the competition. And while trophies and checkered flags are great, it’s so much more than that for the Spaniard.
“To get another one of the Astor Cup is the ultimate goal, but I don’t think it changes whether I get three, or four or five. I think it’s really cool and an amazing career, but it’s more about how much fun I can have while I do it, how much I can push myself, and how much reward we get at the end. But it’s not the fact of having a trophy.”
His goal for next year is simply to keep winning, but he doesn’t expect the dominance of 2025 to last.
“The year we had has been magical. I enjoyed every single second of it. I wish I could encapsulate a little bit of this year and just drink it from time to time, because I know that I’m probably never going to reach this level of happiness. It’s going to be hard, but I just want to get as close as I can next year to this.”
Alex Palou, Chip Ganassi Racing
Photo by: Penske Entertainment
One thing everyone knows about is Palou’s dream of becoming a Formula 1 driver, but he has a complicated history with that specific dream. It has faded away and come back again several times throughout his career.
“I started dreaming about F1 when I was five or six,” explained Palou. “But very early on, that dream went away. There’s no way. I need this, this, and that. And for me, the dream was to become a professional go-kart racer — honestly. That’s what I thought was the highest level I’d achieve.”
However, the dream did not stay gone for long, as Palou noted. “I started in single seaters, (and) that dream appeared again and it was like whoa, maybe this works out and we can have a chance. But then I had two rough years in GP3 … as soon as I had to to go to Japan, that dream was shut down again.”
The desire to pursue a career in F1 returned once more after he became an IndyCar champion for the first time, but IndyCar has remained the true focus for him.
“For me, coming to the US, the dream was IndyCar. That was my dream. When I was in Japan, the dream was not F1. It was IndyCar — that was the goal.”
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