At this point, everyone is pretty much already handing Alex Palou the championship. With a points lead that extends over 100 points and with a zone that the 2021 series champion is currently in, it’s worth sharpening up the engraving tools and getting them ready to put Palou’s name on the Astor Cup.

The 26-year-old is on a string of races to where he’s started 3rd, 1st, 1st, 3rd and 4th and finished 1st, 4th, 1st, 1st and 1st. He’s led 220 of the 520 laps (42.3%) in the process. Mid-Ohio was his 8th straight top five finish on the season and 9th top 10 in as many races run this year.

He’s also scored an astounding 24 top five finishes in the last 42 races.

With knowing that and knowing their capabilities, it’s forcing others to step over the line of aggression in trying to catch him.

Palou made mention lasts week that he doesn’t feel like he’s doing anything differently now than he was at the beginning of the season. It’s just that he’s having better fortunes compared to everyone else’s their mistakes.

“At the same time I just think that everything is working really good for us now,” Palou said. “I feel like we were as strong as we are now at the beginning of the season, but we had some ups and downs during the races. Long Beach was a clear example where we were running in the top four, got caught up on an accident, dropped back to 15th and still finished P5.

“Our performance is there. It’s just we’re able to get the results and get clean weekends, which is not real easy to do very often in INDYCAR.

“I feel like we have momentum. Momentum in motorsports matters a lot for driver confidence, team confidence, mechanic confidence. Everybody want to get the win, just like you are asking for more and more. It just gets better and better.

“Hopefully we can, as I said, keep the wave big or even bigger. Hopefully we can continue having some success.”

Scott McLaughlin and Romain Grosjean crashed into each other with 29 laps to go in the season opener at St. Pete. Pato O’Ward‘s engine sputtered while leading that race after that moment, just a few laps away from the win. O’Ward was overly aggressive in Long Beach and took he and Scott Dixon (finished last) out in the process. Josef Newgarden was on the wrong end of strategy calls at Long Beach and Barber. RLL didn’t have the right setups on the Indy road course, O’Ward and Grosjean crashed in Detroit. Dixon and Power crashed in Road America practice leaving them with bad starting spots. O’Ward pun in qualifying in Mid-Ohio. Marcus Ericsson was overly aggressive on the opening lap and crashed. Colton Herta was on the wrong pit call in Road America and had a speeding penalty in Mid-Ohio.

All these mistakes and Palou being phenomenal in all facets, has handed him a ton of success over the last couple of months. The only mistake he’s had wasn’t on his end. Rinus VeeKay hit him on pit road at Indy. Palou still managed to come back to finish fourth.

“Yeah, obviously everyone needs to beat Palou, but I don’t think — that’s going to be a very tough challenge to beat him in a championship this year. He is so on point in every respect, in every respect,” said third place finisher on Sunday, Will Power.

“He is not missing a thing, which is very difficult in this series to be extremely fast, which there are a lot of guys that are, but then being able to do all the disciplines as well plus the intricacies of fuel save, tire conservation, in-and-out laps, the qualifying.

“Just from a strategy standpoint as well, which I know it’s the first time he won a championship. That group on that car is very smart. Like, they’re putting it all together. Yeah, it’s an absolute team effort, but he is also nailing it.

“It’s bloody hard to have that all nailed, and he is doing it.”

Scott Dixon agreed. He’s seen Palou go opposite as the front starters on tire strategy at Indy and Mid-Ohio and as a result, he put on a whooping on the field. With that and others mistakes, Palou is thriving.

“Yeah, it does make it tough,” he said. “As Will commented, and it’s not just Alex, but Julian, the whole 10 car group are just doing a phenomenal job. Even with Barry as well.

“It’s never a single person. The effort is big I think on all the cars in Chip Ganassi right now, but they’re firing on all cylinders.

“The qualifying is solid, the race pace is solid, strategy is solid. It’s just a really good all-around package right now.

“It’s never always one thing, but having quick paces is something that is huge obviously with how tight the competition is now, but even today we didn’t qualify on the front. We were fourth and sixth, but he was still able to overcome the three possibly quicker cars in qualifying.

“Some others may have had some problems on pit road or just whatever it was. He has done a hell of a job to cover all bases.”

“Yeah, it’s going to be tough to beat.”

Palou opened up an even larger lead now in entering Mid-Ohio 74 points up to leaving 110 ahead. For a driver that said that it’s far too early to points race and that he feels the target on his back is no different now than it was if he had a 10 point advantage, has a two-race gap with eight races remaining.

“It’s kind of out of our control,” said Newgarden. “They’ve had a good run up to this point, right? They’ve not had a bad race. I think that’s to be expected.”

O’Ward was more blunt about it.

“I think we all need to be better if we want to catch the 10 car,” O’Ward lambasted.

Now, can anyone catch him?

This has essentially become his championship to lose.

Palou, even with such a large lead, well he’s not points racing yet. Newgarden nearly overcame a 117 point deficit just three years ago to take the title away from Scott Dixon. Palou knows in this series, anyone can get just as hot as he has.

“If it was another series, maybe yeah, you could try and just finish where you need to finish. In INDYCAR you really can’t,” he notes.

He said that he did points race at the end of the 2021 season, but that was due to trying to secure his championship. He drove under the limit in doing so. This time, it’s far too early to be doing that and he feels like he should try and score more points to get an even bigger gap.

The only real way to catch Palou now though is if he makes some uncharacteristically bad mistakes and I use that in plural since he has such a big cushion.

So far? Palou hasn’t really had that many races that didn’t go well.

What’s even scarier for the field is, he’s just getting started.

“I would say I have more confidence with the car,” says Palou as to why he’s clicking so well now. “I know a little bit more what I need from the car. The same for the team. They know what I need. They know what works for me, what doesn’t.

“In 2021 we were just guessing and trying stuff. Sometimes works, sometimes it didn’t. ’22 we understood a little bit more. This year I just have more confidence with myself, with the car, obviously with the team.

“So yeah, it’s tough to say. I don’t think it’s one thing. I would say it’s a little bit of a lot of things that are helping us be more consistent.”

That’s led to a wave of confidence out of Palou. He feels better now than at any point of his entire racing career thus far.

“I would say it’s getting bigger,” Palou said of this momentum.

“Our performance is there.”

Still, even with performance, I’m watching Josef Newgarden and Scott Dixon to try and catch him over the next six races. Nothing against Marcus Ericsson (-122) or Pato O’Ward (-127), but I feel like that deficit is too far out to catch Palou and in order to do so, they’d have to win at least 3-4 races and finish on the podium in the others. I don’t feel like they’re consistent enough to do so yet.

But, Dixon and Newgarden? Absolutely.

In a six-race span to end the 2020 season, Newgarden nearly erased that 117 gap by having five top four finishes — four of those in the top two. Dixon, only had one podium and two top fives.

So, even if Palou cools some, these two can get hot.

We have Toronto, Iowa (doubleheader), Nashville, Indy Road Course, World Wide Technology Raceway, Portland and Laguna Seca left.

The potential is still there for a comeback.

Dixon and Newgarden combined to have won 6 of the last 10 Honda Indy Toronto’s including 4 of the last 6 and 3 of the last 4 at that.

Dixon is coming off of a runner-up finish in Mid-Ohio and has three straight top two finishes here including a win just last season. Newgarden is a two-time winner.

Then it’s a doubleheader at Iowa.

Newgarden has won 6 of the last 8 oval races including being 2-for-2 this season. He’s absolutely a threat at both Iowa and Gateway which make up 3 races in a 5 race stretch.

Newgarden has led 111 or more laps in 7 of his last 9 Iowa starts including four wins, a pair of runner-ups, a fourth, fifth and sixth place result in the last 10 tries. He’s won 3 of the last 5 there as well as having scored 5 wins in the last 7 short oval races in general.

Dixon may be 0-for-17 at Iowa, but he’s also had five straight top five finishes there too including a pair of runner-ups at that.

Then it’s to Nashville. Dixon won last year and was runner-up in 2022. After is to the Indy road course to where both Dixon and Newgarden have won at. So has Palou, most recently. Then it’s to Gateway where Newgarden has won three straight at.

By comparison, over this stretch, Palou was sixth as a rookie a year ago in Toronto. He was 11th, 14th, 6th and 13th in Iowa, third last year in Nashville and 15th, 12th, 20th and 9th in Gateway.

That could have the trio (Palou, Dixon, Newgarden) fighting for a title come the final month at Portland and Laguna Seca. Palou won in Portland in 2021 and Laguna Seca last year.

The thing is, podiums are no longer going to cut it for Palou’s competitors. O’Ward has squandered finishes of 2nd, 2nd, 4th, 2nd, 3rd and 8th respectively when he’s finished on the lead lap. It’s those finishes of 17th (Long Beach), 24th (Indy 500) and 26th (Detroit) as to why he’s where he’s at today.

Same for Newgarden. He’s won twice (Texas, Indy 500). He’s finished second once (Road America). It’s 17th in St. Pete. It’s 15th in Barber. It’s 10th in Detroit. It’s 12th here. That’s why podiums no longer cut it.

Can Dixon and Newgarden win in bunches over the final eight races or does Andretti Autosport get their act together and steal some wins away too.

I mean think about it, even if those others don’t make mistakes like they did in the first half of the season, Palou can still finish in the top 10 and if they take the wins away from Dixon and Newgarden, it arguably helps Palou.

If O’Ward’s engine doesn’t malfunction at the end of St. Pete, or the caution comes out a bit earlier in Texas, or he doesn’t push too hard on a late race restart in Indy, he could have three wins already.

For Herta, if the final pit call is a better one in Road America, then he wins. If he doesn’t speed on pit road at Mid-Ohio, then he’s putting more pressure on Palou.

That’s the minor differential keeping them from winning 4 of the first 9 races. Instead, they’re 0-for-9.

Which is why I’m also curious that over the course of the final eight races, if they can become themselves again.

O’Ward will be an instant contender at both Iowa and Gateway. He was second and first respectively at Iowa a year ago and 3rd, 2nd, 2nd and 4th in four career Gateway starts.

At Toronto, Herta was runner-up last year. He was quickest in the Iowa test. On the IMS road course, Herta won in May 2022 while O’Ward was runner-up this past May. In Nashville, Herta had a car capable of winning the last two years. For Laguna Seca, Herta has won 2 of the 3 trips back there.

If race day goes their ways, then there’s no reason for Herta and/or O’Ward to end 2023 on a surge.

That ironically enough, if Palou just does what he’s been doing, allows him to probably run away with his championship.