Race Report: BitNile.com Grand Prix of Portland

PORTLAND, Ore. (Aug. 10, 2025) -- "Sometimes you eat the bear, sometimes the bear eats you." A Grizzly took a big bite out of the AJ Foyt Racing team in the shadow of Mt. Hood Sunday afternoon at Portland International Raceway.

The day started out well enough with David Malukas lining up fourth in the No. 4 Gallagher Chevrolet and Santino qualifying 15th in the No. 14 Sexton Properties Chevrolet. An unapproved engine change on the 14 car after the final warmup incurred a six-spot grid penalty but Ferrucci felt through strategy and the 14's fast pace in the final warmup, he could move through the field.

Unfortunately, the race wasn't two laps old when the yellow came out for Ferrucci who lost control of his car coming onto the front straight and spun, hitting the inside wall hard. The No. 14 sustained extensive damage but Ferrucci escaped uninjured.

"I honestly thought the weekend was going to go really well. I’m mad at myself. The team did a great job, the Sexton Foyt Chevy was awesome and we were going to move forward for sure in the race. Just another mistake on my part. We are looking forward to the last two ovals of the year," he said.

Qualifying fifth, Malukas started his race in fourth after pole winner Christian Lundgaard was assessed a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change. Malukas dropped to fifth on the first lap as championship leader Alex Palou slipped past trying to make his way to the front and a ninth win.

A skirmish in Turn 2 resulting in debris on track brought out the second yellow flag.  Kyffin Simpson was penalized for avoidable contact and a separate incident between Kyle Kirkwood and Devlin DeFrancesco resulted in DeFrancesco being penalized for blocking.

On the lap 10 restart, Malukas got hit and tapped the wall which upset the car's handling. From then on it was matter of trying to finish the race. He dropped as low as 17th during pit stop cycles but would climb back up as fuel strategies played out. He was in 10th when he had to pit on lap 104 for a three-second splash of fuel to make it to the end of the 110-lap race. He dropped to 19th which is where he finished.

"Really tough race for us," Malukas said afterwards. "I think we may have picked up a little damage

early on one of the restarts, tapped the wall and I think we had our toe out of play and just struggled from that point on.

"Tough race and it's really unfortunate since it's the last road course of the season. I feel like our road courses were something we really wanted to capitalize on and learn from and try to end it on a high note and unfortunately that didn't come. We'll go back and study the data to figure out what went wrong. We have two ovals coming up to finish out the season so we'll finish off stronger there."

Will Power, who started third, gave a Master Class in driving to pole winner and runner-up Lundgaard to win the first race of the season for Team Penske. It was Power's first victory since winning here last year after starting second to Ferrucci. Lundgaard finished second and third-place Palou clinched his fourth NTT INDYCAR Series championship. Rounding out the top five were Graham Rahal and Alexander Rossi.

The Series returns to action at the Milwaukee Mile in two weeks. That race will be broadcast Sunday, August 24th starting at 2 p.m. ET.

Houses line the Columbia River not far from Portland International Raceway.