Kyle Kirkwood delivered a spectacular performance on the streets of Downtown Detroit to claim victory. The Andretti Global driver dropped back to fourth place due to an unfortunate caution but fought his way convincingly back into the lead. Santino Ferrucci benefited from the same caution and surprisingly emerged as the race leader. He eventually finished second, ahead of Colton Herta, who completed the podium in third.

Start of the race

After the green flag waved, polesitter Colton Herta managed to maintain the lead, while fourth-place starter Christian Lundgaard grabbed second, ahead of Alex Palou and David Malukas. Surprisingly, the entire field made it through the first lap without incident.
Kirkwood, who missed out on pole on Saturday after hitting the wall, showed his pace early in the race. First, the American passed Palou, and a lap later he overtook Lundgaard for second. Rinus VeeKay, who had qualified an impressive sixth, dropped back to seventh and fell even further in lap seven due to engine issues.

Nearly the entire top ten started the race on soft tires, which degrade more quickly. As a result, the leaders made their first pit stops around lap ten. Kirkwood then managed to pass Herta after Herta struggled to get by Nolan Siegel.

First lead change after 15 laps

The first caution of the race came after fifteen laps, when Felix Rosenqvist spun into the tire barriers in Turn 8 on cold tires. To make matters worse for Meyer Shank Racing, teammate Marcus Armstrong couldn't avoid the incident and parked his car next to Rosenqvist's.

This caution split the field in two: drivers who had started on soft tires had either already pitted or did so under caution, while those on hard tires stayed out. This handed the lead to Christian Rasmussen, followed by Graham Rahal and Marcus Ericsson.

Things went wrong right away at the restart. On the straight, Scott McLaughlin collided with Siegel, who spun at high speed and lightly brushed the wall. Later in the lap, Devlin DeFrancesco lost a rear tire, bringing out another caution. McLaughlin received a stop-and-go penalty for the incident with Siegel.

Rahal made an aggressive move by pitting earlier than race leader Rasmussen, behind whom he had been stuck for some time. Things went completely wrong for Rahal in the pits—a lap later he had to pit again, and he lost two laps due to repairs on his right rear suspension.

After the entire field had made its first pit stops, Kirkwood emerged in the lead, ahead of Will Power and Herta. The drivers who had originally started on hard tires mostly ran their second stint on softs. Around the time of the second round of pit stops, the two strategies converged again.

Long green-flag run comes to an end

Unlike the previous two races on the downtown Detroit street circuit, this race ran surprisingly clean for a long stretch, with nearly fifty laps without a caution. That changed on lap 68 when Callum Ilott hit the wall in Turn 1. The Brit had just made a pit stop, during which his left front wheel had not been properly mounted. As he braked into the first corner, Ilott experienced a loss of brake pressure and went straight into the wall.

Almost the entire field pitted under this caution. The only drivers who didn’t were Santino Ferrucci, Kyffin Simpson, and Marcus Armstrong, who had made their stops five laps earlier. After the pit cycle, this trio formed the top three, ahead of Kirkwood, Power, Herta, and Palou. The question for these drivers was whether they could make it to the end on the fuel they had onboard.

Alex Palou taken out of the race

At the restart, Alex Palou’s near-perfect season came to an abrupt end: Malukas locked up into Turn 1 and clipped the championship leader. Palou then slammed into the tire barrier. The damage to the #10 car was so severe that the Spaniard was forced to retire. Malukas received a stop-and-go penalty for the incident.

Once the track went green again, Kirkwood, who had fallen back to fourth, launched a comeback. Immediately on the first lap after the restart, the Andretti Global driver passed Armstrong, and a lap later, Simpson saw Kirkwood’s car go by. Not long after, Ferrucci was also overtaken, despite Kirkwood having damaged his front wing in the earlier contact with Simpson.

Behind Kirkwood, Power and Herta also made progress, though at a much slower pace. With eighteen laps to go, Power managed to pass Ferrucci, but by then he was already nearly five seconds behind the leading Kirkwood.

Heavy crash involving Foster and Rosenqvist, followed by red flag

One lap later, the race was neutralized again—this time due to a major crash: under braking for the hairpin, the left front suspension of Louis Foster's car suddenly broke. Foster veered sharply right into the wall, bounced back onto the track, and collided with Rosenqvist. Both cars ended up slamming into the tire barriers with a heavy impact.

Both drivers were conscious after the crash and able to exit the cars on their own. However, Rosenqvist was assisted onto a stretcher. As a result of the crash, the race was red-flagged a few laps later.

Kirkwood cruises to victory

Once the track was cleared and the barriers repaired, Kirkwood pulled away quickly after the green flag. Power was unable to keep up with the leading car, got overtaken by both Ferrucci and Herta, and dropped to fourth.
Herta then launched an attack on Ferrucci for second place but was unable to make the move stick, even with his final push-to-pass seconds. Power also tried to overtake Herta but came up short.

Out front, no one had an answer for Kirkwood’s pace, as he secured his second win of the season. He crossed the finish line 3.5 seconds ahead of the surprising Ferrucci. Herta narrowly held off Power to claim the final podium spot.

Full results of the race on Detroit