Who is Alex Palou? All about the 4x IndyCar champion who Red Bull has seeminly approached for a seat alongside Max Verstappen

Red Bull has reportedly approached Alex Palou to be Max Verstappen's teammate in 2026. While the IndyCar world has been revolving around the Spaniard in the past half a decade, among F1 fans, he's a relatively lesser-known name.

The two drivers, who Red Bull intends to pair, have defined the 2020s in their respective series. Palou is to Chip Ganassi Racing in IndyCar what Verstappen is to Red Bull in F1. Let's take a look at the four-time IndyCar champion's journey in the premier American open-wheel racing series before discussing why signing him might not be the smartest decision on Red Bull's part.

Alex Palou's unbelievable journey in IndyCar and the road to complete dominance

Being a Spaniard, Alex Palou grew up competing in the European racing circuit. But subpar performances in F3 and F2 thinned his chances of advancing to F1. As a result, he moved to America to race in IndyCar.

After a decent rookie year with Dale Coyne Racing in 2020, Palou joined Chip Ganassi Racing the next year. The new partnership yielded immediate results as he won the 2021 championship, with three race wins and five more podiums.

While 2022 was a blip, with him finishing fifth in the standings, what would follow in the next three seasons would rewrite IndyCar history. Alex Palou won his second title in 2023, with a season exponentially more impressive than that of his first championship. With 10 podiums, of which five were race wins, the Spaniard outclassed his six-time IndyCar champion teammate Scott Dixon to win the title before the season finale, a rare feat in IndyCar.

While his reign atop America's premier open-wheel racing series continued in 2024, it wasn't as dominant. Analysts expected Alex Palou to face an uphill battle to add a fourth IndyCar championship to his list of achievements in 2025. However, the No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing driver proved all of them wrong.

He began the season with a victory on the streets of St. Pete and just kept rolling to win five of the first six races. The last of those five was his breakthrough win at the Indy 500, which meant he had conquered IndyCar in its entirety.

Though he lost some momentum thereon, Alex Palou won three more races. With a podium in Round 15 of 17, the Grand Prix of Portland, he sealed the 2025 championship with two more races left in the season. He became the fourth driver to win three consecutive IndyCar championships after Ted Horn, Dario Franchitti, and Sebastian Bourdais.

All the while, he remained as humble as ever, crediting his No. 10 CGR squad for his outright dominance every chance he got. His sensational run this season was reminiscent of Max Verstappen's 2023 season, where the Dutchman won 19 of 22 races.

Red Bull could risk an internal detonation with Alex Palou and Max Verstappen as teammates

Red Bull has had a big second driver problem in the last decade in F1. None of Max Verstappen's teammates, since Daniel Ricciardo departed from the team, has matched the Dutchman's level. Forget matching, none of his teammates have been remotely close to his performance.

The long list of drivers who failed in the second seat includes Pierre Gasly, Alex Albon, Sergio Perez, Liam Lawson, and the current occupant, Yuki Tsunoda. While the F1 world has seemingly to a consensus that it is Red Bull's car that is the problem and not the driver, the Milton Keynes outfit remains on the hunt for a driver of Verstappen's caliber.

In Alex Palou, the Laurent Mekies-led team will have that. Imagine cloning Max Verstappen and putting him in the second Red Bull seat alongside the original - that's what Red Bull would sign up for with the four-time IndyCar champion. The Spaniard, who has experience as a McLaren F1 reserve driver, albeit being in an ongoing lawsuit with the team over a contractual dispute, might take a year or slightly more to come to terms with the new F1 machinery, but he could eventually match the four-time F1 champion.

It would solve Red Bull's driver problem and potentially make them a formidable force in the constructors' championship, but create a headache if the duo had a car capable of winning the drivers' championship, similar to McLaren's current problem and the great rivalries they have seen in the past.