Four members of the Penske IndyCar team have been suspended for this month’s races. This decision came after an internal review on the Push-to-Pass scandal that shook the IndyCar world last month.
In April, Team Penske saw two out of the three drivers disqualified at St. Petersburg, with the third getting a penalty.
All because of the use of the Push-to-Pass button on the race start. However, the scandal wasn’t just the use of this system. Normally IndyCar’s don’t have access to the Push-to-Pass system for the race start. Meaning the tech inside all three Penske cars had been manipulated.
The three drivers also had different experiences with the Push-to-Pass button.
Will Power was the only driver not to use the button, although his car had been modified to allow it. Scott McLaughlin used it once for 1.9 seconds. Josef Newgarden used it three times for nine seconds. Including to pass Colton Herta.
Newgarden claimed he believed they could use it as it had been allowed in the Thermal Million Dollar challenge.
McLaughlin disputed this saying “I’m not sure why he had that impression,” and Will Power similarly stated, “Wasn’t in my mind that it was a thing, that’s why I didn’t press it.”
The Team Penske scandal led to huge questions that the team seemingly couldn’t answer. Their solution was to hold an internal review to figure out how the incident happened at all.
Results of the Internal Review
Following the review, four team members have been found to be at fault. Team president Tim Cindric, managing director Ron Ruzewski and engineers Luke Mason and Robbie Atkinson will not be present for the Sonsio Grand Prix or the Indy 500 later this month.
Cindric and Ruzewiski are the strategists of Newgarden, the last Indy 500 winner and Will Power, 2018 winner of the 500.
Mason is Newgarden’s race engineer, while Atkinson is Power’s data engineer.
The Team Penske statement said:
“After a full and comprehensive analysis of the information, Team Penske has determined that there were significant failures in our process of internal communications.”
Tim Cindric admitted in his statement that, “It isn’t about what we did, it’s about what we didn’t do.”
Other IndyCar drivers had different opinions on the subject and how much of the Penske scandal was down to miscommunication.
From Marcus Ericsson admitting he thought it was “Fake news,” he was in such shock. Colton Herta calling the excuses “Bullshit,” and inherited winner of St Petersburg, Pato O’Ward, calling the incident “disappointing,”
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