Palou Clinches Historic Fifth IndyCar Title, Lia Block Wins First Overall ARA Rally & IndyCar Pumps the Brakes on Colombia Race Reports

One of the greatest title runs in American open-wheel history reached another milestone in Milwaukee. A 19-year-old carrying one of rallying's most famous names stood on the top step for the first time at the national level. And IndyCar had to clean up a premature announcement from a South American mayor. Here is the weekend in motorsport.

Palou Makes History in Milwaukee

Numbers rarely do justice to what Alex Palou has built at Chip Ganassi Racing, but these ones deserve to be read slowly. Five championships. Six seasons. Four consecutive titles. The youngest five-time champion in American open-wheel history. The fastest driver ever to reach five titles, shattering a record held by A.J. Foyt, who needed eight seasons to achieve the same. And at 29 years old, Palou is not close to finished.

He clinched the 2026 IndyCar Series championship with a race to spare at The Milwaukee Mile on Sunday, completing a season in which he has scored six wins, eight poles, seven podiums, 12 top-fives, and led 673 laps across 17 races. The title also pushed Chip Ganassi Racing past Team Penske for the most championships in IndyCar history, giving CGR 18 series titles and a 68.4 percent championship win rate across the 19 seasons since reunification.

"Everything that I owe to this team, to these two men sitting next to me, that they give me the opportunity to be not only a race winner, then a champion, now a five-time champion," Palou said at the post-race press conference. "It just feels like we started yesterday. We're just getting closer and closer. We're having more fun and more fun each day."

For context on how quickly all of this has happened: Foyt won his five championships over eight seasons. Scott Dixon, who sits second on the all-time list with six, needed 16 seasons to reach five. Palou has done it in six. He is also the first driver to win four consecutive titles since Sébastien Bourdais from 2004 to 2007, and at 29 is the youngest to reach five championships in the history of the sport, besting Foyt (32 when he reached five) and Dixon (38).

Chip Ganassi, who noted with some satisfaction that his organization has now passed Roger Penske on the all-time titles list, was quick to credit the infrastructure around his driver as much as the driver himself. "What has allowed him to do that? The people around him, the team, the partners we've had," Ganassi said. "A lot of people still have fingerprints on this championship today. They're still here. They're still part of this."

When asked whether Palou could eventually reach eight championships and surpass Foyt's all-time record, Ganassi did not hesitate. "Absolutely. I wouldn't want to bet against that."

Lia Block Wins First Overall ARA Rally at Ojibwe Forests

Nineteen-year-old Lia Block claimed her first overall victory at the national level of U.S. rallying on Saturday, winning the Ojibwe Forests Rally in Minnesota alongside co-driver Alex Gelsomino in a Hyundai i20 N Rally2 for Block House Racing.

Competing in the RC2 division of the American Rally Association National Championship, Block finished the two-day event with a time of 1:44:23.1, more than two minutes clear of Javier Olivares and co-driver Leah Brisset in second. The win follows podium results at the Olympus Rally, Southern Ohio Forest Rally, and Rally Colorado, making it four consecutive podium finishes on the national circuit.

Block currently leads the ARA National Championship standings by 21 points with two rounds remaining, the Overmountain Rally Tennessee on September 18 to 19 and Lake Superior Performance Rally on October 9 to 10.

"My first overall ARA win. Hard fought but lead from stage one and finished with a two-minute lead," Block posted on Instagram. "This one has been a long time coming with the disappointment at Snow Drift earlier in the year. Hard work pays off."

The result adds to an already remarkable early career. Block won the ARA Open Two-Wheel-Drive championship in 2023 at just 16 years old, becoming the youngest ever to claim that title. She also competed in the F1 Academy championship in 2025, finishing ninth overall and winning in Singapore.

Block is the daughter of the late Ken Block, the legendary American rally driver and extreme sports icon who died in a snowmobile accident in 2023.

IndyCar Pushes Back on Colombia Race Reports

IndyCar found itself doing some public damage control this week after Barranquilla Mayor Alejandro Char publicly announced that the Colombian city had secured an IndyCar race along the Magdalena riverfront for April 2028, describing it as the series' first event outside of North America.

The series responded quickly and firmly.

"We have met with representatives of Barranquilla in Indianapolis but have not yet visited the city ourselves," IndyCar said in a statement provided to Motorsport.com. "While the city is interested in hosting an IndyCar race in 2028, we are in the earliest stages of due diligence with this and other prospective opportunities. We are a long way from an agreement and any assumption otherwise is premature."

Mayor Char made the announcement during the launch of the Magdalena River Crossing, framing the event as part of a broader strategy to position Barranquilla as a destination for major international sporting events. The revitalized riverfront, once an industrial zone, was presented as the backdrop for a potential street circuit layout.

IndyCar's statement makes clear that nothing close to a contract exists. Exploratory meetings have taken place but an actual site visit from the series has not yet happened. A Colombian race in 2028 remains possible in theory, but it is nowhere near confirmed.