To deny Alex Palou a fourth consecutive NTT INDYCAR SERIES championship, challengers must either have better luck than the Spaniard or match his consistency. Neither of his top contenders have come close to that in recent years.

Two years ago, Scott Dixon was coming off second place in the standings and planning to show Palou more of a challenge. He couldn’t, finishing sixth in points.

Last year was Colton Herta’s turn to serve as the previous year’s vice champion. He, too, had high hopes, and he likewise couldn’t match Palou. And like Dixon, Herta faded in the standings, winding up a distant seventh.

Now it’s Pato O’Ward’s turn to apply some pressure.

O’Ward (photo, top) was literally last year’s best of the rest, a series runner-up, sure, but a staggering 196 points in Palou’s dust. With Palou securing the title with a full two races remaining on the schedule, it was easily the biggest beatdown in more than two decades of this competitive sport.

“We keep saying he can’t raise the bar the previous year,” O’Ward said of Palou. “I have no idea how he’s going to raise the bar from last year. If he does, then I think everyone is toast.”

The pursuit of this year’s Astor Challenge Cup begins Sunday with the season-opening Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. But the 100-lap race that airs live at noon ET on FOX, FOX One, FOX Deportes, the FOX Sports app and INDYCAR Radio, Presented by OnlyBulls is more than one of 18 chances Palou’s opponents will have against him. It’s the first chance to stay close to him.

Last year, Palou overtook Dixon on the final pit stop exchange and sailed to victory, and that started the landslide. Palou won the season’s second race, too, then the fourth, fifth and sixth. By the time he finished drinking the winner’s milk in the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge, he was a distant image in the eyes of everyone else.

Pato O'Ward

O’Ward (photo, above) said he and the rest of the field can’t get discouraged, especially with so many miles to come this year. It will take work and some luck to beat Palou, and O’Ward knows it and needs it.

“We’ve got to keep chasing, keep on going and seeing how we can make him slow a little bit more,” he said. “It’s been too easy on him.”

O’Ward didn’t have the ideal qualifying session Saturday, but he will start the race from the eighth position, which is where Palou launched from a year ago en route to winning. Josef Newgarden also won from eighth in 2020, and four of the past six St. Petersburg race winners, including O’Ward in 2024, have not been front-row starters.

O’Ward will need to be better than he’s been so far this weekend. His No. 5 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet ranked 12th of 25 cars in Friday’s first practice, and it was eighth in the pre-qualifying practice held Saturday morning. He said he and the team, which includes Christian Lundgaard and Nolan Siegel, must be better on Firestone’s alternate tire compound. Each team will be required to use two sets of them in the race.

“We missed the track evolution there a little bit and the balance kind of fell off the perfect window,” O’Ward said. “But we need to see (what happened) because Christian also struggled a little bit. (Eighth) is about where we’ve been today.”

Lundgaard will start the race from the 12th position.

The good news for O’Ward is that he has a history of success on this 14-turn, 1.8-mile street circuit. In addition to the race he won here two years ago, he has twice placed second (to Newgarden in 2020 and to Marcus Ericsson in 2023). Last year he drove from 23rd to finish 11th, which on that day felt like a win.

But O’Ward knows if he is to finally win his first series championship – it would mean dethroning Palou – he needs the season to get off to a good start. Palou will start four positions ahead of him in the opener.

“(We’ve) just got to keep on building to what we’ve been able to accomplish,” O’Ward said. “We don’t want to stay static. We always want to move forward.

“Even if it’s a small step, we want to make sure we don’t stay where we’re at. We always want to go better.”