![]() ![]() That's OK because he prefers to look out the front windshield. Should his team pull it off, there would be a surprisingly short list of firsts for Penske to chase. He's got to pack and head to Le Mans, where he believes he's got a chance to win. The sparkling wine has barely dried from last week's sweep, and Detroit is still buzzing about Sunday's race, but Penske has no time to rest. He wanted a party and his staff pulled it off, even with driver complaints about the actual course. This year he wanted it back downtown and he wanted the event to be a celebration of Ind圜ar, of partner Chevrolet and of downtown Detroit. He wanted more for the city after its cleanup from the NFL title game, so he revitalized the Ind圜ar race on repurposed and dramatically cleaned Belle Isle. It was Penske who brought Ind圜ar back to Detroit after his 2006 stint as chair of Detroit's Super Bowl committee. The race used to be downtown for both Formula One and an earlier version of Indy cars, but it became a hassle and fell off the schedule entirely. Penske cited mechanical failures, pit road mistakes and a letdown from Team Penske to Blaney as to why the driver had struggled to win.Īnd then he was talking about Detroit, where Penske Entertainment was the promoter of the downtown Ind圜ar event. He's relentless, at any age, and offered a vociferous defense of Blaney's 59-race winless streak finally snapped last Monday. "That's what we're here for: to set goals for other people to try to achieve," Penske said. 19 before Penske already was talking about a 20th. He wasn't pleased to be stuck on 18 wins for three consecutive years at Indy Team Penske and Newgarden knew it, too. He last won the Indy 500 with driver Simon Pagenaud in 2019, the year before he bought Indianapolis Motor Speedway. That means seven-time champion Jimmie Johnson is coming along with Rick Hendrick and Jeff Gordon in a crossover nobody saw coming even five years ago.īut all eyes are on Penske, who is on a roll. He joins Chip Ganassi, who has a pair of Cadillacs entered, as well as another Caddy from Action Express Racing, a team owned by Bob Johnson and supported by NASCAR CEO Jim France.įrance also is bringing a version of the Next Gen car now in its second season of NASCAR competition as part of the Garage 56 program with Chevrolet and Hendrick Motorsports. Penske makes his return to Le Mans as the factory program for Porsche, and one of his 963 hybrid prototypes will carry the number 75 to commemorate 75 years of Porsche sports cars in the centennial celebration of the race. The move by IMSA made it the first North American series to switch to hybrid, and it lured new manufacturers to the series with new goals. His quest is part of an agreement made with the NASCAR-owned IMSA sports car series, which reorganized its top class this year to hybrid engines to make its competitors eligible to race at Le Mans. These are the two of the greatest races ever around the world,” Penske said. “I guess I put Le Mans in the category of the Indianapolis 500. Make no mistake, Le Mans means every bit to Penske as those 19 wins at Indy. Penske returned to Le Mans as a team owner in 1971, an effort derailed by early engine failure. He eventually gave up driving - at the urging of his father - to focus on building his global transportation business and, in his spare time, one of the most respected empires in motor sports. The car started on the pole and never ran lower than sixth when, about nine hours into the race, a broken oil pipe ended Penske's only run at Le Mans behind the wheel. Penske himself once entered the legendary French endurance race in 1963, driving a Ferrari for the North American Racing Team. ![]() ![]() And in this same year when he swept Indy and the Coca-Cola 600 - a year he has reigning series champions Joey Logano in NASCAR and Power in Ind圜ar under contract - he also wants to add the only race Penske has never won. He is 86 years old, yet Penske still moves at the same pace he did during his early days dabbling as a race car driver. But just to go there and compete, this first year with Porsche, that’s something we wanted to do for a long time with a quality brand. ”We’ve got three good cars and it’s going to be competitive. “We want to win Le Mans, that’s what we’d like to do,” Penske told The Associated Press. ![]() He leads the American return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans and is due to arrive in France on Tuesday with a three-car effort chasing a victory that has eluded him. The whirlwind week closed with a sold-out Sunday race in which Team Penske driver Will Power finished second, but Penske's engine is still running at full throttle. ![]()
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