IndyCar's Palou is not on Red Bull's radar—shouldn't he be?

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indycar's-palou-is-not-on-red-bull's-radar—shouldn't-he-be? — IndyCar's Palou is not on Red Bull's radar—shouldn't he be?

Rumours placing IndyCar champion Alex Palou on Red Bull’s radar for 2026 appear to be wide of the mark, but shouldn’t several F1 teams be taking a closer look at the US series’ dominator?

With clarity over the short-term Red Bull future of world champion Max Verstappen, which will clear any hurdles for new Mercedes deals for George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli, the end of that transfer soap has taken most of the excitement out what is left of F1’s 2026 silly season.

It really just leaves question marks over the vacant Alpine seat alongside Pierre Gasly, which is still Franco Colapinto‘s to earn right now, and whatever decision Red Bull will make over its four-seat constellation across the two teams it owns.

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The cursed seat alongside Verstappen is another berth that is waiting for someone to claim it, and ever since Daniel Ricciardo departed for Renault nobody has been able to do so, with 2026 Cadillac returnee Sergio Perez having given it the best go for four seasons, which yielded five wins but ended in despair.

In the margins of Perez securing a return to the grid next year, one rumour floated by the Indianapolis Star was that officials at Red Bull have expressed interest in placing reigning IndyCar champion Alex Palou in the seat currently occupied by Yuki Tsunoda for 2026. The report referenced sources with knowledge of those conversations, stopping short of indicating if they came from within Red Bull itself.

When approached by Motorsport.com, first-hand sources within the Red Bull camp responded to the notion of entertaining a move for Palou with surprise and bemusement.

Later on, Red Bull’s advisor Helmut Marko, who plays a big role in its driver selection, told Austria’s Kleine Zeitung on the record that the story is “not true”. Palou himself and his team boss Chip Ganassi also debunked the idea.

Yuki Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar remain the most likely options to partner Max Verstappen in 2026.

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

The most likely avenue for Red Bull remains a choice between keeping Tsunoda and promoting Isack Hadjar from Racing Bulls, although Liam Lawson has also started firing on all cylinders in recent races to boost his long-term career prospects. Team principal Laurent Mekies is known to be a big supporter of Tsunoda after working closely with the Japanese driver at the sister team, much more so than outgoing Christian Horner.

That doesn’t mean Tsunoda has a leg up on the impressive Hadjar, but he is going to get a fair chance until the end of the season to stake his claim, with the understanding that the 2025 car is extremely difficult to drive and Tsunoda has been behind on upgrades more often than not compared to Verstappen.

Given the relatively lack of grand prix experience of all involved, it perhaps wouldn’t be such a bad thing for the trio to stay put for another year. But if it goes that route Red Bull will also have to figure out what it will do with its reserve driver Arvid Lindblad, who is earmarked for an F1 future with the organisation but would depend on one of the incumbent drivers being moved on.

The IndyCar question

Alex Palou prepares to drive guests on the Hot Laps experience

Photo by: Michael Potts / Motorsport Images

While the Palou rumour has been firmly shot down by all parties, it does beg the question; why isn’t an F1 team keen on someone like the Spaniard?

A man who has found a way to dominate what is close to a spec series by claiming four titles in five years, including the rare feat of winning the Indy 500 and the overall Astor Cup in the same year. And a driver who has come in at Ganassi in his sophomore season and had the measure of Scott Dixon, a seven-time champion considered one of the all-time greats.

As recently as 2022, Red Bull was keen on giving his IndyCar colleague Colton Herta a go at its sister team, with the move collapsing over a lack of superlicence points that is still holding the Californian back now. For all of Herta’s merits as a regular frontrunner and IndyCar’s youngest-ever race winner – Palou is undeniably in a different league.

The lack of interest in Europe in the likes of Palou can be seen as a lack of respect to IndyCar as a whole, to which there is some grain of truth as the F1 bubble is hard to pierce for outsiders not coming through its own junior ladder.

Others views are available, including the one that F1 is such a specific discipline and such a risk averse environment that teams prefer dealing with known quantities as they stack their development programs with up and coming drivers constantly evaluated through simulator running, feeder series competition and testing of older cars.

Alex Palou tested for McLaren’s F1 team in 2023, but backtracked on joining its IndyCar squad

Photo by: McLaren

In Red Bull’s specific case, it is in a stronger position now than it was when Herta popped up on the radar, with the likes of Hadjar and Lindblad on a trajectory all the way to the top, and its long running philosophy is to recruit from within where possible.

As if to prove that point, American expansion team Cadillac announced its inaugural F1 driver line-up earlier this week and went for proven experience in Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez rather than an outside wildcard. That too drew criticism from fans lamenting the lack of inspiration and US participation, but few observers will argue that the TWG Motorsports run team – a stablemate of IndyCar’s Andretti Global – has done anything other than the right thing.

In F1 there has been no shortage of homegrown youngsters coming through either with the likes of Hadjar, Kimi Antonelli, Gabriel Bortoleto and Oliver Bearman, which is further vindication that F1’s own development pipeline is robust and that teams simply aren’t being forced to look across the pond.

Juan Pablo Montoya, McLaren MP4-20 Mercedes, Fernando Alonso, Renault R25

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Verstappen himself, who crossed paths with Palou in Europe’s karting scene and showed great respect for the Barcelona native’s achievements, also pointed out it is so hard for F1 teams to judge to which degree success in IndyCar would translate one to one. In the past Williams’ experiments with Jacques Villeneuve and Juan Pablo Montoya proved to be a smash hit. Others, not so much.

“It’s always so difficult to say,” the Dutchman said. “I know Alex already from go-karting times, and I think what he is achieving in IndyCar is incredible. It’s so impressive to see, but it’s impossible to know how people will do in F1 and it’s the same question the other way round. How would you do in IndyCar? You have no idea. I’m just so happy to see doing so well in IndyCar and the way he’s been dominating.”

“He had an opportunity to leave and he decided to stay”

Alex Palou, Chip Ganassi Racing

Photo by: Geoff Miller / Lumen via Getty Images

But F1’s loss is IndyCar’s gain as the series rebuilds momentum under a landmark TV deal with Fox and could use all the star power it can get its hands on. And after the dream of an F1 seat convinced Palou to try and force his way out of Ganassi and into McLaren – which he since backtracked on, the ensuing lawsuit with McLaren is still ongoing – Palou’s interest in the so-called pinnacle of motor racing appears to have cooled considerably.

Having added an elusive Indy 500 ring to his string of titles, one of his eight wins in a crushingly dominant 2025 campaign, you could argue Palou has completed IndyCar, and trying to conquer F1 is the biggest challenge left in the 28-year-old’s career.

But Palou, who has started a family and is settled in the US, has apparently realised the grass isn’t always greener on the other side, echoing comments made previously by one of IndyCar’s other big stars Josef Newgarden. For Palou, life seems pretty good as IndyCar’s king of the hill, boasting a competitive ride and pay check and all the trimmings that come with it, while a move to Red Bull or any other F1 team could end up in an uncompetitive disaster beyond his own control.

Alex Palou with Chip Ganassi after winning the 2025 Indy 500

Photo by: Michael L. Levitt / Motorsport Images via Getty Images

With every sip of IndyCar success, the allure of F1 as a whole fades and the number of appealing seats dwindles, narrowing all the way down to the very top squads that would never consider such a gamble to begin with.

“F1 is not calling me anymore,” Palou told IndyCar reporters in May. “I don’t think they’re having as much fun as I’m having here. I don’t see people celebrating with their wives and their kids as much as we do. I don’t see them hanging in the bus lot or having dinner with their mechanics. I only enjoy driving and having fun and being with my people, so I think F1 is the total opposite.”

His boss was of a similar view. “I don’t think the draw there is what it used to be when we were growing up. There are two or three [good] seats there, and outside of that — I wouldn’t want to see him go and be the number two driver anywhere. I don’t know how you go from winning the biggest race in the world [the Indy 500] to one that’s not.

“He had an opportunity to leave [to McLaren in 2023] and he decided to stay.”