Tag: Team Penske

Blaney DQed at Las Vegas for shock infringement, credited last

Ryan Blaney and the No. 12 Menards Team Penske team have been disqualified from Sunday’s race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway for a left-front shock infraction. NASCAR cited section 14.11.3.5 in the Rule Book. In post-race inspection after the South …

Ryan Blaney and the No. 12 Menards Team Penske team have been disqualified from Sunday’s race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway for a left-front shock infraction.

NASCAR cited section 14.11.3.5 in the Rule Book. In post-race inspection after the South Point 400, it was found that the left-front shock on Blaney’s Ford Mustang did not meet the overall specified length (22.55 inches).

The disqualification moves Blaney to last in the finishing order, 36th, with one point from the event.

The No. 12 crossed the finish line sixth, which would have made him the third-highest-finishing Cup Series playoff driver. He had scored 39 points through his race result, plus a sixth-place finish in the first stage (worth five points) and an eighth-place finish in the second stage (worth three points).

“It was a pretty decent day,” Blaney said before inspection. “We ran in the top five to eight all day. We had a great long-run car, but it took us a lot to get going. Overall, not a bad day. We executed really well, just not quite enough. We have to keep trying to have days like that and find ourselves toward the front and then hopefully contend for wins.”

There were no other issues in inspection.

Logano turning playoff elimination into development mode for 2024

Joey Logano’s visit to the media center Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway must have felt odd. Charlotte marks the second elimination race of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs, which Logano was knocked out of a few weeks ago. It was the first time in …

Joey Logano’s visit to the media center Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway must have felt odd.

Charlotte marks the second elimination race of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs, which Logano was knocked out of a few weeks ago. It was the first time in the elimination era that Logano and the No. 22 team didn’t advance past the first round. He has either been a Round of 8 driver or a championship contender in the finale.

The 2023 season hasn’t been kind to the reigning series champion. Being excluded from the hunt early in the postseason is not a feeling Logano is familiar with experiencing.

“Yeah, it burns, it stings, it’s frustrating,” he said. “But it is what it is. We’ve just been fighting away trying to make our cars better for next year at this point and trying to get as many points as we can. We can still finish up to fifth (in the championship standings), so there is still racing to be done and stuff that makes it worth it. But it hurts knowing you don’t have a chance to win the big trophy, which is always the goal when we start the season.”

Logano has one top-10 finish in the last five races — a fifth-place at Kansas Speedway. And yet the 14 top-10 finishes Logano has on the season is the fourth-most in the series (William Byron leads all drivers with 17).

The bad days, however, have been too much to overcome for Logano. It has been a down season for Ford with aerodynamic deficiencies that have hindered its teams, particularly on the downforce-sensitive intermediate tracks.

Logano earned a postseason berth with a victory at Atlanta Motor Speedway in the spring. He has not won since.

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The team has since begun thinking and working outside the box. Having the freedom to experiment or go down different paths to see what does or doesn’t work is the silver lining of being eliminated from the postseason.

“I can’t say it’s really worked yet, but we’re trying different things or at least answering questions that we otherwise wouldn’t be able to answer,” Logano said. “We’ll swing at it and try things that are out of our comfort zone. I think that part’s good, and maybe we’ll hit on something that helps us. If not, we got what we got.”

With the diverse set of racetracks still in the postseason, one would think Logano’s team will have a good notebook from their experiments. The problem is how quickly setups evolve in the series, and how each weekend requires something different.

“Each road course is different these days,” Logano said. “But really, what we need to make the most difference on now is not only on the road courses but the speedways, and Phoenix in particular as well. I think those places we can keep working on.”

Logano qualified seventh for Sunday’s race at Charlotte.

Ford will roll out an updated Mustang next season, which will coincide with a new production model. It’s great timing for Ford race teams, as the update could help their competitive pitfalls.

“I’ve seen some details on it; it looks cool,” Logano said of next season’s race car. “As long as it’s as fast as it looks, we’ll be all right.

“There are a lot of talks throughout our place and all of Ford teams, I’m sure. Hopefully we made the right decisions. We know which way wasn’t the right way, so we should know what way is the right way now.”

Blaney wins Talladega thriller and lands himself in Round of 8

Ryan Blaney’s No. 12 Team Penske Ford crossed the finish line about a foot ahead of Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick to claim victory in a thrilling final 10-lap push to the YellaWood 500 checkered flag at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday. With …

Ryan Blaney’s No. 12 Team Penske Ford crossed the finish line about a foot ahead of Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick to claim victory in a thrilling final 10-lap push to the YellaWood 500 checkered flag at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday.

With the crucial Playoff win – Blaney’s third on the famed 2.66-mile high-banks — the driver of the No. 12 Team Penske Ford punched his ticket to the next round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs after being points away from elimination at the Talladega green flag three hours earlier.

Blaney led eight laps on the day but was out front the final two laps to secure the win by a slight 0.012s – about the length of a tire — over former series champion Harvick, who is retiring at the end of the season. It’s the 29-year old Blaney’s second trophy of the season and ninth of his career.

 

“I don’t really know, pretty wild last restart, let alone last couple laps,’’ said a smiling Blaney, who admitted he wasn’t sure if he won until his spotter confirmed. “Kinda lost momentum, then getting it back, got clear to the bottom to kind get to the front row and drag race it out with Kevin [Harvick]. It’s so cool to win here three times at Talladega.

“I won it by more than I had the last couple years,’’ Blaney conceded with a laugh. “You just don’t know. You have to drag race to the line and hope you get help. William [Byron] gave me a pretty good shove on the bottom.’’

“This is such a special place to win at so I cannot wait to go to Victory Lane,’’ he said.

Kevin Harvick’s No. 4 Ford failed post-race inspection, resulting in a disqualification. As a result, he was moved to last place in the running order. Playoff drivers Byron, who drives the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, and Denny Hamlin, who drives the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, finished third and fourth. Spire Motorsports’ Corey Lajoie was fifth – his third career top-five finish – just ahead of a multi-car accident before the finish line.

Blaney’s Penske teammate Austin Cindric, Hendrick’s Chase Elliott, Kaulig Racing’s Justin Haley, Harvick’s teammate Ryan Preece and Front Row Motorsports’ Riley Herbst – making only his fourth career NASCAR Cup Series start – rounded out the top 10.

It was a typical action-packed ‘Dega day with 70 lead changes among 24 drivers. Blaney’s teammate Joey Logano led the most laps (24) but finished 25th.

Seven drivers led double-digit laps, but only one of those – Byron – was a Playoff driver.

Hamlin’s fourth place effort was especially impressive considering he was issued a pit road penalty mid-race and had to recover from being a lap down.

“Not how we drew it up, but a dub (W) is a dub and that was a dub in our book,’’ Hamlin said. “As close as it gets to it. Made a statement bringing me a car fast enough for us to win, and obviously when I had to go there, I could, and just made the right moves at the right time and a top five is a long way from where we were with about 15 laps to go.’’

Blaney joins last week’s Texas winner Byron with victories in this three-race Playoff round to earn a position in the next eight-driver round. Hamlin’s rally – after running outside the top 20 for much of the middle of the race – keeps his position atop the Playoff standings (50 points) among those 12 drivers still Playoff eligible.

JGR’s Christopher Bell, who finished 15th, remains fourth in the championship standings. RFK driver Chris Buescher, who finished 20th at Talladega, is ranked fifth. Hendrick’s Kyle Larson, who finished 16th Sunday, holds a 17-point edge on the eight-driver cut-off line tied with regular season champion Martin Truex Jr., who finished 19th at Talladega.

Brad Keselowski, one of two Playoff drivers to suffer a DNF on Sunday, still holds a slim two-point edge on Tyler Reddick for that eighth and final transfer position going into next week’s race at the Charlotte ROVAL, which will determine which eight drivers advance to the penultimate three-race round to set the Championship Four field.

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23XI Racing’s Reddick, who finished 17th, is in ninth place – a mere two-points back. Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain who was involved in an early-race accident and suffered his first DNF of the Playoffs dropped below the cutoff line for the first time this round and is now 10th place, nine points back.

Chastain is tied in points with 23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace, a former Talladega race winner who finished a frustrating 24th on Sunday. His team co-owner, NBA superstar Michael Jordan met up with Wallace on pit road after the race offering a handshake, pat on the back and some encouraging words.

Two-time series champion Kyle Busch still finds himself in a catch-up role, essentially needing a walk-off victory next week at the ROVAL. He finished 26th and now sits 26 points behind eighth place Keselowski.

Keselowski’s position in the standings – thanks in part to his sixth stage win (Stage 2) of the season — is remarkable considering his tough luck day at Talladega. He was among the eight cars collected in Talladega’s “Big One” with 25 laps remaining that brought out a nearly 10-minute red flag for clean-up.

Chastain was the first NASCAR Cup Series Playoff driver to suffer a major Talladega woe — caught up in an incident involving Busch and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. on lap 59 racing toward the lap 60 Stage 1 break. Busch made contact with Stenhouse’s Chevy, which was slowing on track after running out of gas. As Busch swerved to avoid crashing, his No. 8 Chevy caught the corner of Chastain’s No. 1. It sent Chastain hard into the wall and then directly to the garage, his first DNF of the Playoffs.

“It’s just the way it goes; nothing personal with it. I don’t take any of this personally here,’’ said Chastain, who finished runner-up in the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series championship. “Could have stayed bottom a few laps earlier probably. Just had a couple cars laying in my lap and I went for the gap. We’ll study it and be better next time.

“Lefts and rights and living my dream,’’ he said of the crucial ROVAL race next weekend. “Whatever our team brings next week, we’ll put our best foot forward as long as I’m getting to drive these rocket ships that Trackhouse brings me. I’m living my dream and we’ll keep fighting.’’

The Bank of America ROVAL 400 is next Sunday afternoon at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course (2 p.m. ET, NBC, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Bell is the defending race winner.

RESULTS

McLaughlin ‘hit everything but the pace car’ en route to second place at Laguna Seca

By his own calculation, Scott McLaughlin “hit everything but the pace car” on Sunday at Laguna Seca, but it didn’t stop him earning a second-place finish that vaulted him from fifth to third in the championship. “For me, [third in the points] is a …

By his own calculation, Scott McLaughlin “hit everything but the pace car” on Sunday at Laguna Seca, but it didn’t stop him earning a second-place finish that vaulted him from fifth to third in the championship.

“For me, [third in the points] is a pride thing,” said McLaughlin, whose previous best IndyCar championship finish was fourth last year.

“More importantly, we wanted to be the top Chevy team, beat McLaren, and we did that. I wanted to beat my teammates. Ultimately ticked both those goals.

“I talk about beating our teammates… we have a seriously good camaraderie between the three of us. It’s very competitive. It gets tense at times. That’s what you want in a relationship. I think we all push each other to new levels. To beat those two is a proud moment. [I’m] super-pumped.”

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McLaughlin’s No. 3 Team Penske Chevy found itself in the vicinity of several of Sunday’s many incidents, and the New Zealander said that the key to the afternoon was to make the most of the things that he and the team could control, and try not to get thrown off his game by the many things that they couldn’t.

“I think I had one really good restart where I picked off sort of six or seven cars,” he said. “I was just hauling. So much fun.

“But it was wild. I mean, for me as a driver, just thinking of my race, it was probably the most crazy race I’ve ever had in my career just from an up-and-down perspective. It probably takes me back to the year I lost the Supercars championship for the first time. Up and down, penalties, things you could avoid and couldn’t avoid. It was just nuts.

“It was peak IndyCar. To be able to come back from that is pretty cool.”

Power eager for 2024 reset after troubled IndyCar title defense

Outgoing NTT IndyCar Series champion Will Power is ready to move on from a season where off-track matters have sapped some of the attention and energy that he would ordinarily direct towards the job of wringing lap time out of the No. 12 Team Penske …

Outgoing NTT IndyCar Series champion Will Power is ready to move on from a season where off-track matters have sapped some of the attention and energy that he would ordinarily direct towards the job of wringing lap time out of the No. 12 Team Penske Chevrolet.

Power sealed his second championship at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca last year, but comes into this weekend’s race at the same venue looking to fend off what would be his first winless season since his first full-year Champ Car campaign with Walker Racing in 2006. However, with his wife Liz having spent the past year navigating serious health issues, Power said that there have been times during 2023 where driving has not been his primary focus.

“It was a tough year,” Power said. “It was a tough start for me personally, just with what was going on with my family that kind of continued… even at Road America, we had a bit of an issue. It certainly affects your preparation and your mindset. It’s not an excuse, but I know how tough this series is and you can’t have any issues off the track if you want to be good on the track.

“It’s been a real slow process. It’s a tough situation, because if she’s in a situation where I’m not sure what’s going to happen… I was at the point where you probably shouldn’t be racing, because you don’t want your kid to grow up without parents. That was actually going through my mind at the time. Things have improved significantly, so I certainly feel a lot more comfortable.”

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With Liz now making good progress on the health front, Power said he intends to spend the winter looking at where gains can be made in car performance.

“It’s an ultra-competitive series and it’s not hard to lose ground in the championship,” he said. “It just takes a couple of little mishaps, and suddenly you’re trying to claw back. But definitely (it will be) an off-season of really reflecting on what went wrong, and thinking about it, and mental approaches and such, and seeing what we can do about it coming back.”

The fierce competitiveness of IndyCar magnifies the significant of any mishap, Power notes. “It’s not hard to lose ground.” Joe Skibinski/Penske Entertainment

While Power’s struggles have been the most apparent among Penske’s three drivers this year, the entire team fell short of its championship targets. Josef Newgarden, who was the final Penske driver to remain in title contention, was eliminated from the conversation after a late crash at World Wide Technology Raceway. Power said that the team will spend the off-season looking at where it fell short, but he also sees an opportunity for it climb back to the top of the pile when the new hybrid power plants are introduced next year.

“We’ve got to work harder,” Power said. “This series, the teams continually get better and you cannot stop, ever. We’ll reflect; have a good look at everything, and try to understand where we need to develop. But I think there could be a chance to get a jump on the field (in 2024) with a different car, a different style of racing, with the way the hybrid will probably change things. That’s always an opportunity to get ahead of the game.”

Newgarden hops to the top in Portland final practice

In an extremely busy warmup session for the BitNile.com Grand Prix of Portland, Josef Newgarden emerged quickest for Team Penske ahead of Callum Ilott’s Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevrolet. There was little surprise that Felix Rosenqvist was quick to …

In an extremely busy warmup session for the BitNile.com Grand Prix of Portland, Josef Newgarden emerged quickest for Team Penske ahead of Callum Ilott’s Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevrolet.

There was little surprise that Felix Rosenqvist was quick to shine in this final warmup before the race, because only a car issue prevented him from contending for a top four in Saturday afternoon’s qualifying session.

It was David Malukas of Dale Coyne Racing with HMD Honda who first got below 60s, with a 59.8615s lap on Firestone alternates. His time at the top lasted less than a minute as Marcus Ericsson’s Chip Ganassi Racing Honda moved to P1 with a 59.6256s, and he was soon backed up teammate and points leader Alex Palou. Ominously for the opposition, his best time was set on the Firestone primaries.

So too was the best time from his teammate Scott Dixon, the only man who can stop Palou from claiming a second crown, and who is starting a row ahead of Palou on the grid. Dixon was fifth, ahead of Rinus VeeKay, who, as in practices one and two, was shining in the Ed Carpenter Racing Chevrolet.

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With under 13 minutes to go, Newgarden, who crashed out of qualifying earlier in the afternoon, bounced to the top on Firestone alternates with a 59.4533s. Teammate Will Power then joined him in the top five, while Ericsson slid through the Turn 1/2/3 chicane without harm. VeeKay jumped to third (again on alternates), and Colton Herta entered the top five (again, alternates).

Tom Blomqvist, who has had his engine changed since qualifying last, looked strong in the Meyer Shank Racing Honda, running in the top dozen for much of the session.

With under five minutes to go, Palou — now on alternates — lowered his lap time to a 59.5716s, although this was very slightly shaded by Callum Ilott of Juncos Hollinger Racing who will start tomorrow’s race from eighth. His teammate Agustin Canapino grabbed sixth on his alternates, just a breath slower than Dixon and ahead of VeeKay.

Almost all drivers completed more than 20 laps, as teams judged the degradation over the course of a stint, with a maximum of 28 by Newgarden, Power and Pato O’Ward.

The race begins at 12:30 p.m. PT time, 3:30 p.m. ET Sunday.

RESULTS

Team Penske, Wood Brothers Racing make a trade ahead of 2023 playoffs

Team Penske and Wood Brothers Racing have made a trade ahead of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs.

[autotag]Team Penske[/autotag] and [autotag]Wood Brothers Racing[/autotag] have made a trade before the start of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs. According to an announcement from Team Penske, Austin Cindric’s crew chief Jeremy Bullins will move to the No. 21 team while Harrison Burton’s crew chief Brian Wilson will move to the No. 2 team. This will remain in place for the rest of 2023 and 2024.

Bullins was previously with Wood Brothers Racing when Ryan Blaney drove the No. 21 car from 2015-2017. Over that period of time, Bullins and Blaney won the organization’s 99th Cup Series event at Pocono Raceway by holding off Stewart-Haas Racing driver Kevin Harvick. Now, he returns to the No. 21 car to guide Burton.

Wilson only has two full-time seasons of experience in the Cup Series; however, this will be a reunion with Cindric after the duo competed together in the NASCAR Xfinity Series from 2019-2021. Cindric won the 2020 Xfinity Series championship and 13 races overall. In total, Wilson has 23 victories across the Xfinity Series with several notable drivers.

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Newgarden paces Penske-dominated WWTR practice as Power crashes

Team Penske finished the rain-delayed opening session for the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 with all three cars in the top four, led by Josef Newgarden, but Scott McLaughlin suffered a spin that sent teammate Will Power into the wall and into the …

Team Penske finished the rain-delayed opening session for the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 with all three cars in the top four, led by Josef Newgarden, but Scott McLaughlin suffered a spin that sent teammate Will Power into the wall and into the path of Marcus Ericsson.

Almost eight hours after it was originally scheduled to occur, IndyCar’s one-hour opening practice session at World Wide Technology Raceway commenced at 6:50 p.m. local time, with the rain finally gone for a while.

Colton Herta of Andretti Autosport was the first driver to break into the 178mph zone, with a 25.2607s lap of the 1.25-mile candy corn-shaped oval. Then Newgarden – chasing a remarkable record of winning all oval races in an IndyCar season – clocked a 180.040mph effort, ducking beneath 25s.

Alexander Rossi then moved to second for Arrow McLaren but then was the first driver to switch to the alternate tires, a new venture for Firestone and IndyCar this weekend. While he was testing the durability of this softer rubber, his top time was eclipsed by Scott McLaughlin – who will have to take a nine-place grid penalty for an early engine change – and Felix Rosenqvist in another McLaren. Rossi completed over 30 laps on the softer rubber, but felt the fronts going away from lap 24.

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Takuma Sato became the fastest of the Chip Ganassi Racing cars with a 179mph lap, moving into third, as last year’s WWTR polesitter Will Power ensured all three Penskes were in the top four.

With 10 minutes to go the yellows came out when Sato appeared to graze the wall through Turns 3 and 4, but the two-time Indy 500 winner kept the sidewalls of his reds paint-free. Colton Herta also survived an amazing fishtail moment when his car snapped every which way, but after pitting he continued unfazed.

With Sato not rubbing the wall, the session of course resumed swiftly, but the cars only had a couple of laps to get up to speed before there was a significant shunt. McLaughlin spun coming out of pitlane, firing across the grass onto the track. Edging high to ensure he avoided his stricken teammate, Power hit the Turn 2 wall hard enough to collapse his right-side suspension. He spun out of control and into the path of Marcus Ericsson, the Ganassi car impacting Power hard nose-to-nose. The pair was thus precluded from taking part in Saturday night’s high-line practice session.

Also abandoning his hopes of taking part in the high-line practice was Graham Rahal, who felt a major handling imbalance on his Rahal Letterman Lanigan Honda which could not be cured by the end of the session. He was 5.5mph off teammate Christian Lundgaard, and 7.5mph adrift of newest teammate Conor Daly, who did a fine job in his first session as replacement for Jack Harvey and wound up eighth.

RESULTS

Team Penske, A.J. Foyt Racing form technical alliance

Team Penske and A.J. Foyt Racing have forged a new technical alliance that should benefit both NTT IndyCar Series teams in the short- and long-term. On the more immediate front, the two-car Foyt team is making use of dampers and technical support …

Team Penske and A.J. Foyt Racing have forged a new technical alliance that should benefit both NTT IndyCar Series teams in the short- and long-term.

On the more immediate front, the two-car Foyt team is making use of dampers and technical support provided by Team Penske during the final races of the season, but the arrangement goes much deeper than go-fast parts and assistance with chassis builds and setups.

The relationship, which will expand in the coming years, will see Penske place younger crew and engineering staff within the Foyt team to gain IndyCar experience, and in time, when some of Penske’s Force Indy drivers are ready to graduate from Indy NXT, the Foyt team will be ready and capable of running a development driver on Penske’s behalf in IndyCar.

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“We had seen those relationships happen in IndyCar whether it was Shank and Andretti, or we obviously have our relationship similar to that concept in NASCAR with the Wood Brothers,” Team Penske president Tim Cindric told RACER. “And we’ve used it as a training ground for people, whether it’s drivers or crew or engineers or whatever else, as long as we can control the IP or kind of have some direction on where it all goes, but still have a good relationship.”

The concept of a Penske-Foyt alliance was established by former Foyt leader Scott Harner in 2022, but with his departure for Andretti Autosport, the topic was parked until a recent outreach was made by Larry Foyt.

“I’ve known Larry and A.J. Foyt forever,” Cindric said. “And just before Iowa, Larry called me up and said, ‘Hey, I don’t know if you’re open to revisiting it, but would you be interested in trying to try to help us in some way and maybe working together in a way that you and Scott had talked about?’

“I said, ‘I’m glad you called because, I’ve been thinking about something like this, and maybe not this year or next year, but at some point in time, if we’re helping guys like Myles Rowe, as an example, who we’re helping to come up the ladder system, and if they win the Indy NXT championship, what are we going to do with them?’”

While the Foyt team will welcome Penske’s technical support, Penske will benefit from being able to place young crew members, engineers and possibly even drivers at Foyt to gain experience.  Michael L. Levitt/Motorsport Imagesz

Penske’s approach to hiring IndyCar talent tends to involve the signing of proven veterans, rather than young rookies fresh off the open-wheel ladder. And with the likes of Rowe and Ernie Francis Jr, who are supported by Penske through his Force Indy program, the need to establish a satellite IndyCar operation where a talent like Rowe and the personnel who would learn to work in IndyCar with an affiliate team​, stood out to Cindric as a worthwhile bridge to build.

“We’re not really the team to put a rookie into one of our cars right away, but you want to have some connection to them,” he said. “So if I’ve got two or three engineers that are ready to be race engineers, I don’t want to lose them to our competitors, but they’ve got to grow too, so this would be an opportunity for that to happen with Foyt. And then even some of these kids that are part of the Force Indy program that are looking to move up from NXT, we may or may not have a spot for them, so how do we keep them in the fold?

“And if Myles or Ernie or somebody else we’re invested in becomes ready for IndyCar and the financing is right, we like the idea of being able to work with a Foyt team we’re​ already involved in, so it made more and more sense to look at something like this​ where we can place good people with them.

​”I told Larry, ‘Why don’t we try and help you the best we can, and we don’t have to do a big formal thing. Short-term, let’s keep working on this and build it out to where it benefits both organizations.’ So in the last few weeks, we’ve started helping those guys and we’ll continue mapping this thing out for where it will go down the road.”

Through the link to Penske, the Foyt team has a newfound attraction that should draw interest from a wider range of drivers and commercial partners. RACER has already heard about the Penske-Foyt alliance from a number of quality drivers who’ve expressed a desire to join the Foyt team as a result of Penske’s involvement.

“We think it’ll help them attract the right people, the right sponsors, and the right drivers, and we feel we’ll be able to get some benefit from it on our end,” Cindric said.

“It’s already evolved to where I think we have a really good understanding of how it will continue to develop.”

Disappointed McLaughlin says Nashville restarts were ‘a joke’

Nashville polesitter Scott McLaughlin was left downbeat after being unable to convert his car’s pace into victory in the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix. Although the Team Penske driver led the first 24 laps of the race, with Pato O’Ward’s Arrow …

Nashville polesitter Scott McLaughlin was left downbeat after being unable to convert his car’s pace into victory in the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix.

Although the Team Penske driver led the first 24 laps of the race, with Pato O’Ward’s Arrow McLaren simply unable to keep pace, the field was bunched on lap 13 by a caution for an on-track mechanical failure for Dale Coyne Racing’s David Malukas. Alex Palou took the opportunity to pit, but the other front-runners did not, and while staying out was obviously the right way to go for the primary-tired runners, the teams whose drivers started out on alternate rubber were going to lose tire performance long before they ran out of fuel.

McLaughlin nonetheless pulled away from his pursuers on the restart, but the untimely yellow meant the field was still running close together when he finally had to cede his lead and pit. Thus he was buried in the pack, and when those who started on primaries such as eventual winner Kyle Kirkwood and Romain Grosjean made their stops, McLaughlin hadn’t found the clean air to make time on them, and they rejoined ahead.

What disappointed him in the closing laps is that, having passed Grosjean to run second, he didn’t have the pace in the two final restarts to tackle Kirkwood.

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“Yeah, yeah, I’m disappointed, but it is what it is,” said the former Supercars legend. “I think we had a really fast car today. That first yellow destroyed a few things… You hope it doesn’t come, but it came. You take it or lose your advantage, try to reset and go again. That’s what we decided — the latter.

“We did pretty well. We were able to come back a little bit, but overall Kyle just had that little shorter stop that he could do [and] away they went. I was trying to do my best to hunt him down at the end; I just had a poor restart.

“I had no temp in my rear tires for some reason. So annoying. I don’t know what happened; I didn’t change my procedure. I’m normally pretty good on restarts, but I was terrible. Got to do a little bit of study on that. I think if I was a little bit closer, I might have been able to maybe throw a little dive bomb at him. Unfortunately, couldn’t.”

McLaughlin didn’t like the new restart zone between Turns 9 and 10, as he felt it actually bred chaos, almost guaranteeing the shunt that caused a red flag before a four-lap shootout.

“I just think from a sport perspective, the restarts are a joke. I think we need to start on the start/finish line. We cannot pass until the start/finish line…You’re always going to have these clusters that cause red flags and make us look like…

“There’s no cadence. Once there’s a yellow flag on a street circuit, it’s just a free-for-all. People [dive-bomb]. We’re well within our rights to do that. If we want to have a pure race, we could have had a 10-lap shootout, me and Kyle there at the end. Instead we’re stop, start, stop, start. The action is fantastic. We just have no race.

“I think it happens at Long Beach. We talked about doing it — about not passing till the apex of the last corner… I think when it goes green, there’s kamikazes at the back that don’t care — well within their right to throw it inside when it turns green. That’s fine. But we just have this terrible stop/start, amateurish looking finish to races.

“I’m going to speak to Jay [Frye, IndyCar president] about it and [Kyle] Novak [race director]. We just need to go apex last corner or start/finish line – make a point where you can’t pass, just to get it going.

“Look, I might be wrong. I might crash in Turn 1. What I’m saying — I’ve done it in Supercars. Formula 1 does it. Other sports around the world do it. It just gets the race going. Everyone is on cold tires. Someone is going to have a mistake.”