Category: NTT Indy

INDIANAPOLIS (Thursday, May 13, 2021) – The 2021 Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge Official Souvenir Program is on sale now and features one of the most unique covers in race history: A three-time Indy 500 winner drawing his friends and rivals, the race’s four-time winners.

Johnny Rutherford, winner of the 1974, ’76 and ’80 Indianapolis 500 and a passionate artist, used a pencil method to draw the cars of the winningest drivers in Indy 500 history who all share an anniversary in 2021 – A.J. Foyt, Al Unser and Rick Mears – for this year’s program cover.

Rutherford drew the roadster Foyt drove to his first Indy 500 victory 60 years ago, in 1961; Unser’s Johnny Lightning Special he earned his second Indy win with 50 years ago, in 1971; and Mears’ iconic red-and-white car he won his fourth Indy 500 with 30 years ago, in 1991.

“It’s an honor to be able to be a part of this project and to do this program cover,” Rutherford said. “I just hope the fans like it and everybody enjoys the fact that it was me, a three-time winner here, that drew that. Add this to what I’ve accomplished at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in my career, and it’s special.”

The program cover was an artistic collaboration between Rutherford and IMS graphic designer Amiah Mims. After Rutherford provided the drawings of the cars, Mims reimagined the 1980 INDYCAR SERIES champion’s artwork in a digital format and integrated it onto a digitally created background that highlights the cars Rutherford drew, as well as the world-famous Yard of Bricks.

Mims is also a freelance artist who has been involved in Indianapolis-area works such as Welcome Race Fans 2019, the Black Lives Matter Boarded Window Mural project, the Black Lives Matter Street Mural project and the Indianapolis Recorder building mural, among other projects.

“Designing, illustrating and painting has always been my passion, and I’m proud to be able to use my love for art to help tell the history of the Indianapolis 500,” Mims said. “It’s an honor to be one of many artists to have had a part in the Indianapolis 500 and to work alongside a legend like Johnny Rutherford.”

The Official Program was created with the help of three well-known printing organizations. The program cover was printed by Lake County Press, while the interior and binding of the program was printed by Hess Print Solutions. The customer loyalty poster insert was printed by Miles Printing, a woman-owned and local printing business.

The Official Program Cover features a four-color process with a metallic ink, tinted varnish and two reticulation plates.

The 208-page souvenir program is available now for $15 at shop.ims.com and at Official Trackside Gift Shops at IMS and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum.

Many great feature stories about “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing” are included in the program, covering topics such as:

• The results of the Race for Equality & Change after just 10 months
• A touching feature on retired IMS Historian Donald Davidson
• Appreciation for the IMS Ticket Office and one of the Speedway’s hardest workers, Linda Price
• Reliving Marco Andretti’s pole-sitting run last August and what it meant to him
• A recap of the 2020 Indy 500 and the impact of its lack of fans by IMS President J. Douglas Boles
• Defending Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge winner Takuma Sato
• The story of how Pato O’Ward went from failing to make the Indy 500 to becoming the race’s 2020 Rookie of the Year
• The fast friendship of Rinus VeeKay and Alex Palou that formed out of quarantining together during the COVID-19 pandemic
• The bright future of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum
• A celebration of Indy 500 anniversaries in 2021, including the 100-year anniversary of Tommy Milton’s first win
• The Official Program also features biographies of drivers attempting to make the field of 33 for the 105th Running of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge on Sunday, May 30.

CHEVROLET RACING NTT INDYCAR SERIES
GMR GRAND PRIX
INDIANAPOLIS MOTOR SPEEEDWAY
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER ZOOM CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
TEAM PENSKE DRIVERS JOSEF NEWGARDEN AND WILL POWER PRE-INDIANAPOLIS GP QUOTES
MAY 12, 2021

TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET DRIVERS JOSEF NEWGARDEN AND WILL POWER met with media to discuss upcoming NTT INDYCAR SERIES race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course:

THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the NTT INDYCAR SERIES video news conference with teammates Will Power and Josef Newgarden from Team Penske.
Gentlemen, both of you had success last year on the road course here at Indy in the Harvest Grand Prix with Josef winning race one and Will winning race two.
Will, you have four wins and five poles here at the road course in Indianapolis. How excited are you to get back to the road course where you’ve had so much success?

WILL POWER: Yeah, always a track that I thoroughly enjoy. The field is so tight this year you have no idea where you’ll stack up. We were pretty good at Barber. That was a road course, smooth road course. Hopefully some of that transfers over.
But I think our baseline setup there is pretty good. The temperature matters a lot there. You can have a very different car depending on the wind, the temperature, if it’s rain or whatever.
But, yeah, never take it for granted we’re going to turn up strong, always ready to react on the fly. Yeah, certainly looking forward to starting out there.

THE MODERATOR: Josef, you had a P2 finish in St. Pete on a street course.
How excited are you to get back to a road course where you started P2 last year for the Harvest Grand Prix and ended up on the podium in the winner’s circle?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Just like Will, it’s always been a good track for us and Team Penske without a doubt. We’re going to try to follow up where we were at last year.
Temperature-wise I think Will brings up a good point. We seemed almost a little stronger on the 2 car specifically in October. I’m hoping that carries over. I think the weather is going to be cool looking at it, not necessarily super hot. If the wind is not to our liking, like Will said, we have to be ready to react pretty quickly.
Excited about it. Excited to have Snap-on running on our car this weekend, which will be quite cool. A unique livery. Celebrate their makers and fixers. Very excited about that.

THE MODERATOR: The weather is going to be cool, in the 60s, but sunny at least through Saturday. Happy about that.
WILL POWER: I love Snap-on, so yeah. I have Snap-on everything. Maybe I should have had the Snap-on car. But Verizon 5G is still someone I’m very loyal to. Yeah, I just wanted to put that out there and let everyone digest that the way they would like. Thank you.
THE MODERATOR: I’ll have you guys work that out with the captain.
WILL POWER: Yeah (laughter).
THE MODERATOR: We’ll start with questions.

Q. Will, you got to admit, it’s a crappy day outside here in North Carolina, isn’t it?
WILL POWER: It is. If you want to come over and watch How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days or something like, that I’m all for it. Just chilling in my basement. Up to you.

Q. Maybe I’ll stop over and bring some barbecue with me.
WILL POWER: Sounds good, Bruce (smiling).

Q. The Friday race last October was one of the best road races we’ve seen at the IMS road course. What do you see the reason for that being? The length of the race was different in the Friday race. It was a more action-packed race than what we’ve seen in some of the previous races at IMS on the road course, which if you get out front at the right time, you can cruise to victory.
WILL POWER: I would say it certainly was the difference between the Friday race and the Saturday race, the fact that of the distance. It opened the windows, the strategy window, up significantly so you could try different strategies, pit on different laps, just created good racing.
Actually I haven’t looked at the distance. I know we sent the series a lot of information on race distance, how to open the windows up, make it so it’s not a fuel race. Hopefully I did that.

Q. Josef?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I agree with Will. It’s just the fuel windows. A much better race on Saturday because they were open windows. I think that’s the goal going back, is to try to keep those windows as open as possible. It just creates opportunity to run a completely different strategy than people around you, make it work. I think that’s the key, is providing options to people.
Once they have them, it makes the race instantly more entertaining because there’s just a lot more going on.

Q. Speaking of entertaining, Mr. Entertainment himself, Juan Pablo Montoya, is going to be driving an INDYCAR the first time since 2017. How happy are you to mix it up with him? Arrow McLaren SP is a pretty good team this year. Put Montoya in the mix, it’s interesting.
WILL POWER: Is he running the road course as well?

Q. Yes.
WILL POWER: Is Helio running the road course?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I believe he is.

Q. He’s not. He’s just doing the 500.
WILL POWER: Okay.

Q. He’ll be doing the Music City Grand Prix.
WILL POWER: He picked a right one there. That’s a special town, not because of its history in country music, but because Josef Newgarden lives there. As I’ve said before, he is what I’d class as a god-like figure based on his social media. So, yeah, I’m excited to go there. I’m sure Helio is, as well.

Q. How about Montoya?
WILL POWER: Oh, yeah, Montoya. Yeah, no, it’s cool that he’s back in the series. Juan, he works it out pretty quickly. I think he’ll help that team with all the experience he’s had. I think he’ll really help them on the oval actually. That’s where he’s very strong.
Yeah, it will be fun to have him back in the series. Always a great character, someone that you don’t want to mess with on the track or off the track.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I mean, I would agree with Will again. I think Montoya’s strength will be more on the oval. I think he’ll be a very strong teammate for both Rosenqvist and Pato. I think he’ll help the team a lot with what they’re doing and just be tough to beat. He’ll be difficult to beat.
Road course-wise, think it will probably be harder for him, I really do. He’s Montoya, so he could surprise all of us at any moment. I think he’ll have a tougher time just getting back up to speed.
The field is so tight, like Will said, you can’t even make the smallest slipup nowadays. You can be way in the back, like 20th.

WILL POWER: Yeah.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think it will be hard for him to get back up to grips with the road course car.
WILL POWER: I’ll see you in an hour or so, Bruce. The barbecue, remember that (laughter).

Q. Will or Josef, because you’re going to spend so much time at Indianapolis over the next few weeks, Josef, it looks like you’re moving house to Indianapolis anyway, but driving this direction this weekend, the other direction from Monday onwards, does it actually play into your mindset when you’re on the main straightaway at Indy or do you blank it out because you’re doing what you got to do?
WILL POWER: Yeah, I mean, doesn’t even register. Totally different track, different downforce level. So, yeah, I have to say in all the times I’ve done it, it hasn’t even registered. It’s such different disciplines, you could say.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I’m like Will. It’s so completely different that you’re almost hitting it in stages. The first stage of a big month, kind of really focused on that. Then as soon as you get done with it, you can start thinking about the oval event and the 500.
Having said that, we have people working on the 500 the whole off-season. Even before we show up for the GP, we’ve been working on the 500. We get locked in on the GP event, get the most of that. You get a good cadence leading into practice the next week, then you roll into the big show.

Q. Will, is there anything specific that you can pinpoint as to why you’re so good at the road course in Indy?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think it’s Bruce’s barbecue. Something about when Will and Bruce get together there’s a 24, 48 hour window. Bruce is available, Will gets that barbecue, that guy sings on the track. He just sings. I don’t know what it is. It’s something in the brisket (laughter).
WILL POWER: I would agree with that because the years I’ve won it, yes, Bruce has come over and we’ve eaten barbecue and we’ve watched chick flix. There is something to that. Maybe it’s the attitude of going into the weekend, an attitude of bliss and happiness.
On a more truthful note, honestly I enjoy the track. I’ve done well at pretty much every track we go to in the series now. Yeah, in particular just a fun road course, consistent grip all the way around.
Yeah, it’s hard to pinpoint whether it really suits my style because we go to other tracks where it is a completely different style and I’m still quick.
Yeah, don’t know. I think the team’s very good there, period. So you’re starting off with a good car, then obviously you got to do the rest. Yeah, I actually really enjoy it. A really fun track.
You can certainly push the limits because, you know, there’s not many walls or anything to hit there. You get to the limit pretty quickly. I couldn’t pinpoint a reason apart from all the work I’ve done over the years on the craft.

Q. Josef, obviously you did really well last season. What do you think you can kind of improve, if anything, for this year to get to victory circle?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Well, I’m disappointed I’m driving up to Indy, I was trying to be over in North Carolina today with Will. I would have liked to have gotten on this barbecue meeting, chick flix. I’ve got to look at different ways to be good.
I thought we were very strong. Hopefully I haven’t frozen here.

THE MODERATOR: You jinxed yourself, Josef. You were doing great, then you froze. Now you’re back, but you’re muted.
WILL POWER: He shouldn’t have talked about Bruce like that (smiling). He’s muted again. Take your ear phones out, Ashley won’t care.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I much prefer to listen to Will, to be honest with you. I don’t know that it’s a tremendous loss that you’re not being able to hear me (laughter).
I think we hit on something pretty good last year with our car specifically. I felt good about our car in the summertime, too, when Will and me were up front in that race before the yellow happened.
I’m excited. We just got to try and make sure we qualify well. I think that’s pretty important at the GP. Definitely make your day a little bit better. So if we can do that, I think we’ll have good cars, like Will said.

Q. Josef, there’s been quite a lot of talk about INDYCAR drivers in Formula 1 over the past few weeks, spurred by Colton winning at St. Pete. Obviously you went over to GP3 and had a short period of time there. What was it that brought you back to the States? Was it how attractive the Road to Indy program is? The style of the tracks? The limited time you had to get used to racing on the calendar?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It’s kind of a shame. I think it’s just a shame to see the animosity amongst the two series. I consider both of them world class championships, both Formula 1 and INDYCAR. I think there’s just a lot of parallels you see (indiscernible).
WILL POWER: We can’t hear you, mate. Your headphones.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I figured this would be a shame if I broke up on this, because it’s a great question. I don’t know that I can really answer it super well in these conditions. Got toilet paper behind me (laughter).
Jack, if you remember this, you ask me this question again at some point. I would love to see some young drivers get over there. Both Pato and Colton I think would do extremely well in Formula 1 personally, in my opinion. It’s a great question.
I hate to see the animosity between some of the fans amongst the series because they’re both great championships, really great. I think they have so many parallels together.
I’m just a huge fan of seeing the crossover, more often than not, whether that’s drivers, mechanics or engineers. I’d love to see some more. Hopefully we get some young guys from our side competing over there.

Q. There’s a lot of points on the table this month. You have a doubleheader in Belle Isle after. How do you balance the championship, thinking about the championship, also the 500 as a driver? The championship at the end of the year can be decided over these next few races.
WILL POWER: I’ve never been a big fan of the double points at the 500. I believe you should never be thinking of the championship when you’re racing to try to win that race. If you’re in the hunt to win it, not that you’re thinking of that, but if you’re fifth and you’re down the last stint, the last 10 laps, there’s no chance to win, you won’t fight as hard. You might consider just taking the points.
Yeah, I just think it shouldn’t be double points, it should be normal points. It should be 100% about the race, shouldn’t be about the championship, in my opinion.
Yeah, obviously like you said, massive stint in a short period of points coming up here. It will play a huge part in who’s going to be a contender at the end of the year.

Q. Josef, do you think championship yet? Is that even in your mind? Are you still just trying to get the season going?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think it’s still pretty early. Even at Indianapolis. I completely agree with Will. I’ve not been a big fan of the double points scenario, both at Indy and the championship finale, quite frankly.
Yeah, you’re not thinking of points at Indy until it’s over. Those come in moments. You think about qualifying, you’re always trying to be fast, always trying to be in the top nine shootout because you know there’s points there, but more so because you want to start up front in the race.
You’re first thinking about doing well in the race, starting up front. Then after qualifying is done, then you think about the points implications. If you had a good qualifying, it helps you in points. If you didn’t have a good qualifying, you worry about what it did to you in points.
The race is the same way. When you’re in the race, you’re thinking about doing as well as possible in this event. You get one shot at it every year. It’s such a big deal. You’re just trying to win the race.
After the fact you kind of have to settle with whatever that was. If it was a winning day, it helps you tremendously in the points. If it wasn’t, then you’re feeling horrible about leaving there, being in a hole probably in the championship.
Yeah, I don’t like it. I think Will brings up a good point. If you’re fifth or sixth, do something strategy-wise to win the event, you may not do that nowadays just because you don’t want to sacrifice the negative of losing a bunch of points if you get it wrong. I don’t like that element.
For the most part you’re not thinking about championship when you’re in the event.
WILL POWER: Is the final race double points this year?
THE MODERATOR: No, just the 500.
WILL POWER: I thought they got rid of that.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I don’t know if they carried that. I know we did that last year.
THE MODERATOR: Not the finale. That was two years ago. Just the 500. I just verified that with Arni, the knower of all things.
WILL POWER: Unless you’re behind, of course, then it’s terrible (laughter). Change the rule.

Q. When it comes to being successful, how much is it about pure speed and how much is it getting comfortable in the car?
WILL POWER: I would say successful in this series is often about luck because if you get caught on the wrong side of yellows, it can totally ruin your day because they have this terrible rule where the pits close on the yellow.
Obviously speed matters massively. You might question that if you look at last year’s championship where Dixon won probably three races because of yellows and qualified horribly.
For the most part, yep, if you can qualify at the front it helps. Lottery yellows, I love to stick the knife in and let people know how bad they are.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It’s a tough equation. It’s just tough. I feel like you have good years and bad years when it comes to luck. You just don’t know. I don’t know how you really control that. You just got to work as hard as possible at all moments and try to put yourself in position to be ready to capitalize. There’s some things that are just out of your control.
WILL POWER: I think a pretty safe strategy is pit when Dixon pits because nine times out of ten you’re going to catch a lucky yellow, like last year on the Indy road course. If you just, like, watch Dixon, qualified 17th, me and Josef out leading by a mile, Dixon pits, INDYCAR is going to throw a quick pit, Josef would have won the championship for sure. I probably would have been in the hunt, yeah.
You can tell Josef hasn’t been destroyed multiple times by yellows, and he’s still kind of on the fence. Well, yellows have helped me out a few times. A few more times of Dixon getting the lucky one, him not, he’ll be right onboard, Yep, the yellow thing really, really stinks.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I’ve not been beat to a pulp quite as much as Will has when it comes to yellow flags. I don’t have as many wounds. It’s not fresh for me. But I understand it.
WILL POWER: Honestly, it’s a really bad system because if you qualify well, you’re more subject, because I have qualified well my whole INDYCAR career, you’re definitely more subject to getting screwed by a yellow. If you don’t qualify well, you are going to pit early and take a risk, go fishing for that lucky yellow.
That’s where I think it’s a horrible system, a horrible system that has nothing to do with merit. Totally to do with luck. It almost goes the other way: it hurts the guy that does a good job. Horrible system. Must change.
Think I got my point across (laughter)? It’s the truth, though.
Look, I can promise you nothing will change. We actually went to the INDYCAR meeting. Helio was in there. Walked out, said, Nothing has changed in 20 years. He’s right.

Q. Speaking of frustrations of yellows, another side of frustration can be keep coming close to winning and not winning. Is the frustration building in having not got there yet or is it too early in the season to have that buildup?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It’s becoming almost unbearable at this point. So close, yet so far. No, I’m kidding.
It’s been okay. We definitely have been in the mix, which is most important. Step one is just getting in the mix, giving yourself an opportunity to win a race. We definitely have been there two out of the four events we’ve had so far.
I feel really positive. I think we’re doing a lot of things right. Probably not the start of the year that we would have dreamed of, but it’s been good enough to where we can build on it. That’s kind of where we’re at. We’re trying to build on what we’ve done so far, continue to improve.
I think we just need to keep doing what we’re doing because we’re plenty close enough in the fight. You keep to doing that, eventually it will cave open. We will make sure the door caves open.
WILL POWER: Caves open? That’s the way.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Knock it down.
WILL POWER: Knock it down.

Q. Josef, it’s been a little bit of a rocky season so far for you with some incidents that have happened, yet you’ve managed to be No. 4 in the championship right now. You bounce back, you’re always able to bounce back. You bounced back last season. What’s the secret? How are you able to do that?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Look, I’m telling you, I don’t want to give my secrets away, but it’s barbecue. I live in Tennessee. We got good barbecue, too. I know Bruce has some magic stuff there that Will has been taking advantage of every now and then. It’s the diet. It’s really the diet that keeps you resilient. I don’t know. It makes me more rubbery, just makes me bounce back.
I don’t know what to attribute it to. We have a very resilient team I think in general with all of us. Certainly within our group specifically, when things happen that are negative, certainly the first race was very negative, then you just got to move forward. Whether it’s me or a member on the team, it’s one of the engineers that’s not feeling good, we just always are moving forward. I think we have that mindset that we’re always moving forward. That kind of keeps us in a good place performance-wise.
WILL POWER: I think we all need the barbecue just based on today’s social issues.

THE MODERATOR: We’ll close out today with Asher.
Q. For both of you. You were both winners last October for the Harvest Grand Prix. Josef was the first winner on day one, Will was number two, number one in day two. There’s only one race for the GMR Grand Prix, so only one of you can win. What is one of you going to try to do to try to get it to the front or make a repeat win?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: What do you think, Mr. Power?
WILL POWER: Hopefully we roll off the track pretty good. It’s a couple of short sessions, straight in qualifying. I think we’re pretty well-prepped. It will come down to qualifying well, or if you don’t, catching a lucky yellow. Obviously making no mistakes in the race. Might as well make a couple risky moves.
Like Josef said, keep knocking on that door and eventually the yellow flag monster will answer. Or just a win, or the I’ve-worked-hard thing will come to fruition.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I would agree. Thanks for the question, Mr. Asher. I hope you’re excited for the weekend. I know that we are.
I would love to have a duel with Mr. Power on the track. That would be fun as long as it doesn’t end badly for both of us. I think it will take qualifying well, decisive decision making because we don’t have a lot of time. It’s going to go really fast.
You’re going to roll off the first practice, pretty much how your car is is what it’s going to be. If it’s not good, you have to make quick decisions to make it better before you qualify. A fast-paced weekend that you have to basically get the most out of very quickly. Whoever is best at that will do really well.
WILL POWER: Actually I think that we deserve to resume our battle that we were having at the first race last year, and Dixon should be back starting 17th. Let’s replay that and see how it really would have finished.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I would have liked to have won. It’s a shame we didn’t get to see.
WILL POWER: It would have been quite an interesting good little battle.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I would love an opportunity to snooker Mr. Power. I like that we can snooker these guys. Very hard to do, though.
WILL POWER: You’ve snookered me more times than I’ve ever snookered you. I owe you a snookering big-time.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Can we just say ‘snookering’ all weekend? That’s the new word we have to fit into our interviews.

Q. Do you think there will be another push-up battle between Will and Josef?
WILL POWER: I reckon I might be able to beat him right now. I’ve done a lot of weights recently. I’m pretty sure I can get him in push-ups right now, pretty sure.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: We should have another battle.
WILL POWER: Let me know when. I’m probably going to get you. Probably going to get you this time.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I don’t think so. It’s a good suggestion.

Q. How many push-ups do you think they should do? 500 or what?
WILL POWER: In a workout you can definitely do 300, no question.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: How many in a row can you get right now, Will?
WILL POWER: No, I haven’t been doing many in a row. They’ll all been, like, intervals with 10. I’ve been doing chest, weights, single arm chest push, whatever you call it, single arm dumbbell press.
THE MODERATOR: Then you add in the barbecue.
WILL POWER: I’ve got bigger muscles than I’ve ever had right now. Trying to stay in my weight bracket.
I’d like to add that Josef sent me a very, very disheartening text message last night. He hasn’t apologized for it. That’s something that’s kind of upsetting me, I would say (smiling). I should tell you what he said. He said my wife does everything for me. That’s what he said. And she does (smiling).
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I did not know what you were going to say. I actually was confused about what text message you were talking about.
I was complimenting Liz. Liz is very organized and professional. Some people don’t seem to know that, but they’re going to know that Liz is very professional.
WILL POWER: There’s no question. Liz is certainly on top of her game. She has two children to deal with. I contribute a lot. You’d be surprised, Josef. You would be surprised. I bathe my little boy every night, put him to bed. I don’t ever cook dinner, never cook dinner. The missus, she’s too on it, man. Just something I don’t do. But I would.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: You’re a lucky man, Power.
WILL POWER: I don’t know. I reckon old Ashley does probably quite a bit for you.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: She’s amazing. I would not function without my wife.
WILL POWER: You hear that, Ashley?
ASHLEY NEWGARDEN: He has to say that because I’m driving.
THE MODERATOR: We’re going to end it there. I would suggest similar to our Andretti Autosport friends that you guys start a podcast together, like Hinch and Rossi. I think it would be entertaining and there would be a lot of subscribers.
Thank you everyone for joining.

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CHEVROLET RACING NTT INDYCAR SERIES
GMR GRAND PRIX
INDIANAPOLIS MOTOR SPEEEDWAY
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER ZOOM CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
ARROW MCLAREN SP DRIVERS PRE-INDIANAPOLIS GP QUOTES
MAY 12, 2021

ARROW MCLAREN SP DRIVERS PATO O’WARD, FELIX ROSENQVIST AND JUAN PABLO MONTOYA, ALONG WITH ARROW MCLAREN SP PRESDIENT TAYLOR KIEL met with media to discuss upcoming NTT INDYCAR SERIES race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course:

Felix, what learnings did you take out of the two races at Texas Motor Speedway, and how prepared are you to head to Indianapolis for the month of May?

FELIX ROSENQVIST: We can be that fast on a super speedway. Maybe not all of it translates to the 500, but I’m sure of it is going to do that. I think personally as well, I’ve felt better than I’ve ever done on an oval. I think that’s kind of a good step. I really started to learn what I need from the car, and I think my engineer Blair (Perschbacher) and all the others on the No. 7 (Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet) will start to understand what I need to feel comfortable.

As I said, the points haven’t come, which is a shame because we have had some really good potential in at least three of these four rounds we have had so far. That’s how it is. We have a good chance to strike back here in these two, and there’s double points at the 500, so that’s encouraging. You just have to keep fighting and it should be good.

We’ll go now to Pato. First-time race winner at the last race in Texas. Pato, how do you build off that success you had in Texas, especially given that you’re second in the championship right now? Where does that put your priorities heading into the Indy GP and also the rest of the month of May?

PATO O’WARD: Thank you. Yeah, I think we are rolling into the month of May with some great momentum. We want to keep it going. Especially leading into the 500 and the rest of the season. There’s a long season still ahead; many races and many opportunities to be able to execute and get some more results in the bag. I think the approach will be the same as any other weekend that we’ve been to, trying to execute come qualifying and keep our nose clean during the race, have a quick race car. That should really put us in contention for a podium or a win. That is the goal for this weekend, the same as it’s been for every single weekend since 2020. Yeah, I am looking forward to it.

Thanks, Pato. Now we’ll go to the newest member of Arrow McLaren SP, Juan Pablo Montoya. Juan Pablo, this is going to be your first IndyCar race since 2017. You’ve obviously been racing other cars since then, but how do you prepare yourself for your first race in an IndyCar in almost four years?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: Well, I think first of all try not to freak out (laughter)! I think we got a decent test in Laguna (Seca), and learned and understood a lot of what I needed out of the car, and got it in the swing of things. The two days at Indy in the oval were really nice to get everyone together. We need to understand the priority of running the road course, apart from having a really good result, is working well with the engineers and everyone on the team.

If everyone is a new group of people, and they’re really good people, and to get them bonding together is really important. And understand what I need out of the car. It’s such a compact schedule, and I think it’ll be good. It could be frustrating; there could be anger moments, and there could be good moments. But I am looking forward to it. I am really working hard to prepare myself for it. And we’ll see what it brings. We had a session in the simulator last week, and the baseline was pretty good and the pace seemed pretty good. So I’m looking forward to it. One of the curveballs is the red tires. Learning to get the most out of it will be really hard, but at least we’ll get a set out of it in practice. Back in the day, we didn’t use to get them.

Thanks, Juan Pablo. Taylor, I’ll piggyback a bit off that and ask you a follow-up question. What a lot of people may not realize is our third crew at Indianapolis, the No. 86, are all full-time employees of Arrow McLaren SP. How important is it to have the Indianapolis GP to prepare those guys, who aren’t normally a race weekend crew but are important to the team to get ready for the Indy 500?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: I think one of the most important things there is to understand that they are full-time employees, but work different jobs. Like Craig (Hampson), my engineer, he’s not running a car normally. He’s looking after everybody. I think in a way it’s good because there’s a lot of experience. There’s a couple young guys working on my team that came from England as well. I’m really excited. I think we have a great group of people, very experienced mechanics, and everyone is pumped up about it. With Pato winning the last race, it shows the potential of the car at Indy, so now you have to execute. If we screw up, we have to make sure we screw up in the Indy GP and not in the big race!

Taylor, do you want to follow up on that?

TAYLOR KIEL: I think Juan covered it pretty well. That’s why we made the choice to run the road course race was to get some more experience with that group. It’s the only thing that separates them from Pato and Felix’s cars, they just did it a week ago. It’s important where we are at an advantage over the other one-off cars, and that we’re doing that. That’s what it’s about, like Juan said, to put ourselves in the best position for the 500. That’s what it is.

Pato, what’s life been like for you now that you are an IndyCar winner?

PATO O’WARD: It’s the same, now with the title of having one win under my belt. It’s all the same. The approach to everything is the same. We’re the same people, same persons, nothing has changed. We just have had a taste of what a win feels like and now we want more of that! It’d be great to rack up some more if we can.

For all three of you, the IndyCar races on the IMS road course have been kind of pedestrian, but the Friday race last October was one of the best road races they have had there. What’s the reason why that particular race was so good last year, when others have been about how the strategy falls?

PATO O’WARD: I’ll take it first. I think in my opinion it is about the amount of laps (85) opened up it for either a two-stop fuel save or a three-stopper. Whenever you take away some laps, and force everyone to do a two-stop, is when things get boring I guess. So I feel like, this year is the same amount of laps (85) that road race you mentioned was good. I think it’ll be a good mix this weekend.

FELIX ROSENQVIST: I think it’s also depending on weather, tires and how they operate together. I think INDYCAR is doing a good job in experimenting in that a bit, with race length. Sometimes you don’t know how it’ll play out. One day the red tires are degrading, the next they’re good for a whole stint. We may have a hard time figuring out what it’ll be, even with our best predictions. That’s part of the fun, you know? Sometimes it’ll be an awesome race, and others it’ll be completely different than what you expect. I’m sure we’ll be surprised with some this weekend as well.

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: I’ve watched the races, but as Felix said and as Pato said, it depends on strategy, when the cautions come out, and if people save fuel. If they do that it is normally a pretty quiet race. Everybody tries to stay in line, draft, save fuel and go as far as they can. It becomes who can go the furthest. When you’re not racing hard, versus when you get cautions, the pack is packed up, the cautions mix the pack. It’s frustrating sometimes, because you could be on the right strategy leading the race, and someone tries a different strategy and the caution comes out and you can come out of the pits 10th when you were leading and you finish 10th. And you don’t even know why? But that’s the nature of IndyCar. In a way it’s their problem not mine, I’m just a one-off so I want to run as good as I can this week and see what we can bring.

Taylor, reflecting at Pato’s win at Texas, just being able to put into words what it means for Arrow McLaren SP, it really is a sign of what the whole program is based on. It’s about showcasing their talent of young drivers.

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: Thank you for the young (laughter)!

TAYLOR KIEL: Yeah, I think there’s a few things to that. Certainly there is the young talent piece. That’s a small part of it. The other thing is putting the best people in the best positions to take advantage of what we’re building as a team. We have that with Pato and Felix and certainly Juan. But this has been a long journey. I think at a certain point you get sick and tired of being a mid-pack team that occasionally sneaks out a victory. When you have a partner lineup like we do, the support from ownership and everyone to take advantage of it, it’s a great position. It requires thoughtful planning and organization. That’s what we have been able to do slowly over time, and now we are starting to reap those rewards.

Texas is certainly Texas. That’s it. We’re onto the Indy GP, then onto the Indy 500, then a bunch of races after that. But now we have an organization that knows how to win. From an importance perspective, it’s very important. But it’s certainly not the end of the journey. It’s not putting our feet on the desk and saying, we’ve won Texas, we made it. We still have a long way to go. We’ll see shortly how far we’ve come.

For Juan Pablo, during the Indy 500 test-, you did an interview (with NBC Sports) about you’d heard from Arrow McLaren SP about running Indy and Roger Penske said no. Could you elaborate, and how hard did you push to do this earlier?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: Well, with Roger, when it’s no, it’s no. Zak (Brown) called me the last two years and I said to him, ‘Well, I don’t think they’re going to let me. If you want to call him, call him, but I’m pretty sure the answer’s going to be no.’ And he called 10 minutes later and he said, ‘Yeah, no, you’re not running!’ So this year, now that I’m running a different program, I talked with Zak and I thought the challenge was exciting, and as everyone is saying, Taylor mentioned they’re going in the right direction.

The timing is very good and the potential to run the Indy 500 is perfect. From the timing point of view, working with Craig and the experience he has, and how open-minded he is, the potential is huge. It’s been fun, because I’ve worked with people before and you show up and they go, ‘Well, this is the way we need to run it.’ Craig is very open-minded, and has a lot of experience. So we can work together where I say, ‘Hey I want this out of the car, I don’t like this,’ and he’s got a lot of previous laps and experience where he can go, ‘Oh, I understand what you mean.’ So it’s very easy to communicate and we seem to find direction really quickly.

I’m very stubborn when I don’t like something; I really don’t like it. And we’ve been there already. And we laugh about it. I told him before the first test, ‘There’s a few things especially in the Indy oval, if I don’t like it, or feel comfortable, I’m not even gonna try it.’ Because normally, that’s when you make a mistake and end up having a shunt for no reason, with something you wouldn’t even think about racing.

You seem very excited to be back at Indianapolis and the Indy 500. How much did you miss it and were you surprised by how much you missed it?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: Honestly, I loved the sports car program, and I really enjoyed endurance racing. Still working with Penske was a lot of fun. All that time was cool. I think this opportunity was unreal, to be honest with you. In my mind, I never thought I’d run Indy again. Because Roger would never let me at the time. I’m 45, whether you like it or not. I believe I still can perform. And I’ll give you an example. We’re in Spa, running WEC (World Endurance Championship). I was running hard, but I feel like I’m miles off the pace. And we qualify like ninth in (LMP2) class, and I drove from ninth to third, and I passed people on the brakes, and I out-brake and outsmart people. It was really good. Oh, I can still do this!

Felix, you’re going back to a track where you’ve had pace before. Do you think you can get one with the AMSP car here?
FELIX ROSENQVIST: Yeah for sure, I’ve been quick here before. I wouldn’t say it’s a track I like more than others, but I had a pole here my rookie season which was fun. I think it’s more what we’ve done in the background, developing the setup, what Juan talked about. I spent a lot of time with Craig and my engineer (Blair) to build a package I think will work better than Barber and St. Pete. It’ll be exciting to see what we come up with, because I definitely think it’ll be a bit of a difference. It’s less depending on the track. When we find the sweet spot of where we want to be, I think it’ll be from every track for the rest of the year. We saw that in Texas with something I liked. That’s the direction we’re going, and working to strike back at the GP after a tough first four races.

Juan, I noticed you’ve had Sebastian (Montoya) with you in Europe. What is it like having him as a driver around? I know he’s been around as a son, but now he’s a driver. Is it fun to have someone who now understands the driving side with you?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: Yeah I think it’s exciting. We had a really good conversation with me after Spa. He’s been with me, getting ready for his new season. He has his first race of the year this weekend here in Italian F4.

In the car, something you don’t understand is how good you are. He’s got crazy talent and crazy speed, but he’s like, ‘I don’t know.’ Honestly, you see how good I am and he’s like, ‘Yeah, you’re so good,’ and I’m like, ‘I still believe you can kick my rear end every day.’ So imagine how good you are. And he’s like, ‘Really?’ He needs a little bit of confidence and needs to learn a lot. He’s young, you know what I mean? He turned 16 last month. It’s crazy the potential he has. Once we get to cars with a little more downforce and he’s not sliding around like the F4, he really hates that car. But he needed the experience. We did a test in Barcelona in Euro F3, and I think he was the quickest guy of the week. We ran the first two days, and then the track gets better. Then the team is like, ‘Oh my god, how quick is this guy?’ And I’m like, ‘I know,’ but he doesn’t!

Juan, what do you see of ‘younger you’ in time you’ve spent with Pato and Felix so far?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: I think they’re very different driving styles, both of them. Pato’s the guy that you put the wheels backwards, and he’ll still make a good lap time! And you don’t know how, but he does, and that’s great for him. But he needs to, and we’ve spoke about it, he needs to learn a bit more about what he needs for the long runs. His potential is unreal.

Felix’s, I think his driving style is a lot more similar to mine. You want a car that doesn’t want to kill you! I think that’s been the biggest thing. For Felix, when I got in and I was like, ‘I can’t drive this!’ He’s like, ‘I’m glad I’m not the only one!’ (laughter) It’s been really good. We work to make a much friendlier car and much more consistent in a race, because if they can build a car that’s consistent, the results will be much more often in the front.

And then Pato and Felix, your thoughts on what you can take from Juan going into this month?

PATO O’WARD: For me it’s just so much experience, and a lot of input in areas where I don’t know how to explain what I need from the car. Especially in manufacturer stuff like downshifting, seeing if you have a certain issue in the downshift, seeing where in the downshift it is, and just understanding more about the car. I don’t really know how to explain it, but I think you can tell the experience he has when he explains things. I’m trying to learn as much as I can, and even without spending weekends together, with the Laguna test and the Indy test, I have just comprehended a little bit more about what things do. That helps me tell my engineers more about what I need, and that’s been a win-win situation. Like I said, in my career, I’ve been so used to driving what they give me, so I’m not a big whiner. But I need to whine more, because I think we can extract a lot more when it’s easier to drive. Like Juan Pablo said, it doesn’t want to kill you, I guess!

FELIX ROSENQVIST: I agree with Pato. I’m kind of in the middle between Pato and Juan Pablo in my career. I have had the opportunity to work with a lot of experienced drivers, like Nick Heidfeld, Scott Dixon, and Gary Paffett when I was in DTM. When you have a teammate that has done so much, as Juan Pablo has done, you realize the reason he’s good is because he knows what he wants and knows how to get it. Everyone understands that’s the way it has to be. Like Pato said, I got so far in my career by jumping in driving whatever I had. I didn’t complain about it. I told my engineers what I wanted, and for me it was very clear, when I raced with Scott and now with Juan Pablo, if you want to race for championships that’s where you need to be to make the difference. Everyone has the talent. There’s huge talent in IndyCar in the whole field. Those details are where you can make your life easier. If it’s easier for you, and make the car do more work for you, that’ll be a different kind of race.

Pato, so you’ve been with the Arrow McLaren SP team since the beginning. How has your confidence and trust grown, and how does that help build momentum for the Indy 500 and championship?

PATO O’WARD: I think just having a full year under our belt is what has given us a bit more efficiency in a weekend, knowing what I want. There’s barely any running in the weekend from session to session, so it’s important to be efficient with changes and know what you want to go in the right direction. That’s helped us. But I don’t necessarily think it’s so much different to last year. This year we are showing what we had last year. We just didn’t quite execute. The goal has been, don’t screw up. If you don’t screw up, you’ll win races. For me, going into the 500, it’s a race where if you’ve never done one before, there’s no way you can prepare yourself for that. Ever. You just can’t. I feel like once you do it a year, you’ll understand what to expect, for traffic running and having a good car to compete at the front and win.

Juan, when you’re going from series to series, you’re going through different cars. What’s the most difficult thing to adjust to?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: I think the hardest thing is adapting to the tires, in the feel of what the tire wants. Every car is different and every manufacturer builds them different. So when I run here, we’re with Firestone. In Europe, we’re with Goodyear, and in IMSA we’re with Michelin. So you go from the spectrum of the Michelins, which are super fast with tons of grip, while the Goodyears are the P2 cars, they’re a little more intermediate – a little harder and more difficult to drive – and it is what it is. You learn to make the most out of it. But it’s so good because it keeps you on your toes the whole time. The other thing that’s hard is, here, it’s good because it’s my car with my engineer and group of people. When I run in IMSA, I’m the third guy. So I don’t even have a voice or a vote. I say what’s happening, but I’m just the filler guy.

In WEC, we have Ben (Hanley), who’s the younger guy, myself, and then we have the gentleman in the car. It’s a different program. There we need to make the car drive really good, and we work a lot on the gentleman, Henrik (Hedman), to get the best out of him. If we make the car two tenths quicker for us, that’s great, but if we can make Henrik go two seconds a lap quicker, that’s a bigger improvement than anything else. It’s a different challenge, everything is, but as Pato said before it makes experience even better. It makes me look at things in a different way and makes things much simpler.

Taylor, you have two Latin American drivers, how important is that for the team for the region.

TAYLOR KIEL: I think they could be from Mars, right? But it’s about the best drivers available. Pato and Juan, their Latin heritage brings them together. But as a group, I’m focused on putting the two best drivers in the car regardless of age, race, ethnicity, gender, it doesn’t really matter to us. Bringing Juan and Pato together is the best move for our team. They’ve proven that, and we’re excited to get going.

Juan, how do you adapt your driving style to IndyCar after being most recently in WEC?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: I think the hardest thing there is remembering what I want from an IndyCar on a speedway. It’s all about how fast can you go. The more comfortable you are, the quicker you’re going to be. For Pato, what I want may be completely different. Maybe he goes, oh, the thing can’t turn. Maybe he’s more comfortable with the car stepping out. For me, if the car is uncomfortable on the entry, I’m going to keep my foot on the brake until I feel I can release it and know the car isn’t going to snap out on me. Where Pato may trust the car a little different, and rotate. If you give the car more understeer, I may be able to turn it more to be more aggressive with my hands. You may make it turn more. You have to know what you need. The hard thing is we only have two sessions, maybe two or three runs each, and two, three, four, five laps and you’re done. So we’ll see what happens.

I’d talked to Sebastian (Montoya) and he said he might want run at Daytona next year (2022 Rolex 24 At Daytona). What are your thoughts?

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: (Laughter). I don’t want to think about that yet! It’s too early to be honest. We need to see where I’m going to run next year. If an opportunity to run in a car together with him came up that would be amazing. I think it’d be great, he’d learn a lot if we are in the same car. He’d have to be more flexible in the way drive and brake. In Europe, they tell you, this is the way you need to brake, this is the way you need to turn. And when you’re young, that’s what you do, and you do that to make lap time. When you learn to drive all the cars I drive, the best way to describe it is I drive depends on what the car needs, so I turn and brake a different way. Different cars have different cornering ways. I don’t have a set driving style, but I do have my preferences.

Taylor, you’ve been part of Robert Wickens’ journey in the team. What’s your reflection on him getting in a car last week, and the feeling in the team around that?

TAYLOR KIEL: I thought it was great. Since day one, we’ve been behind Robbie in any number of ways. Certainly, it’s been his main ambition to get back in a race car. I think our support for him both away from the racetrack, at track, and in any endeavor he wants to do has always been there. So when an opportunity came to hop in a car, good on you, go for it. I was thrilled to see him back out there. I spoke with him afterwards, and he had a blast, but he was already thinking ‘Man, can we do this? How can we do that?’ We’re going to go to the drawing board and help him out any way that we can to see if we can help realize his new dream, which is getting back into a race car. We’re certainly supportive and proud of Robbie for what he’s put in. We’re excited to see where the journey goes and how we can be a part of it.

For Pato, how much momentum does the win give you into Indy and the 500?

PATO O’WARD: I think it’s great momentum, the best we can carry into the month. The approach is the same. We want to continue fighting at the front. The most points we extract out of the GP, the better it will be for the 500 and so forth for the rest of the season.

How beneficial is it to have Juan Pablo for the GP and the 500?

PATO O’WARD: It’s good. He has loads of experience. The guy knows what he wants from a race car. I think we can learn a lot from him in trying to extract the most we need from our cars.

FELIX ROSENQVIST: I’d agree with Pato. It’s also good for us to have a third source of data. We’re a team that is growing, and don’t have a lot of time to try new things with limited track time on a weekend and in winter testing. There’s not a lot of running. It matches well with our plans from an engineering point of view to run a third car, try different stuff. Juan Pablo is a huge input source. He’ll tell you what he wants. If he doesn’t get it, he’ll keep asking for it. It’s pretty exciting for all of us. It changes the dynamic in the team for the better.

Taylor, by being Pato’s strategist, how has this process of building confidence and chemistry occurred race-by-race?

TAYLOR KIEL: It’s been a process, no doubt, as any relationship is in our lives. But it’s also super critical to off-track success. Understanding how to read body language, tone of voice, and being involved in the process from start-to-finish, to be close to the engineering group, driver group, mechanics, you can paint a clearer picture of what’s going on. That’s not limited to just strategy on race day. To me it’s a big part of building the team and everyone being on the same page. The race day piece takes care of itself. Although we’re growing and on a growth trajectory, we do try to stay small in a few aspects. Those are communication within the team, interpersonal communication with myself, management, drivers, and always trying to keep our finger on the pulse. When you do that on a day-in, day-out basis, with quick decisions or otherwise, you take in the human element. If you look across the paddock, those teams with a massive amount of success like Scott (Dixon) or Josef (Newgarden) just to name a couple, those have longtime people in their ear, on their timing stand both with Mike (Hull) and Tim (Cindric). Continuity is big. I think the relationship piece is big. It’s a daily effort. How do you build it day-by-day? That’s what I’ve tried with Pato, and also Felix and Billy (Vincent) have a good relationship as well. It takes time, but the rewards can be reaped on the back side as well.

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35 Cars Entered To Compete in ‘The Greatest Spectacle in Racing’ May 30

INDIANAPOLIS (Wednesday, May 12, 2021) – Nine winners – just one shy of the event record – are among the field of drivers assigned to 35 cars entered for the 105th Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge on Sunday, May 30 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Three-time winner Helio Castroneves (2001, 2002, 2009), two-time winners Juan Pablo Montoya (2000, 2015) and Takuma Sato (2017, 2020), plus single winners Scott Dixon (2008), Tony Kanaan (2013), Ryan Hunter-Reay (2014), Alexander Rossi (2016), Will Power (2018) and Simon Pagenaud (2019) are the past winners aiming for another victory this year in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.” The record for winners in one field is 10, set in 1992.

Castroneves will bid to become the fourth member of the elite four-time winner’s club featuring A.J. Foyt, Al Unser and Rick Mears. Sato, 44, will try to become the first repeat winner since Castroneves in 2001-02 and the first driver ever to win the world’s most prestigious auto race three times after age 40.

The field includes eight past INDYCAR SERIES champions: Sebastien Bourdais, Dixon, Hunter-Reay, Kanaan, Montoya, Josef Newgarden, Pagenaud and Power. Dixon is the reigning and six-time NTT INDYCAR SERIES champion.

A talented trio will compete for Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge Rookie of the Year honors: RC Enerson, Pietro Fittipaldi and Scott McLaughlin. Fittipaldi is the grandson of two-time Indianapolis 500 winner Emerson Fittipaldi.

2010 Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year Simona De Silvestro returns to the race for the first time since 2015, attempting to make her sixth start in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.”

Andretti Autosport has entered six cars, the most of any team.

Practice opens Tuesday, May 18 and runs through Friday, May 21. Crown Royal Armed Forces Qualifying is scheduled for Saturday, May 22 and Sunday, May 23. The traditional final practice, two hours again this year on Miller Lite Carb Day, will be held Friday, May 28.

Live Race Day coverage begins on NBC and the INDYCAR Radio Network at 11 a.m. (ET), with the green flag set for 12:30 p.m.

2021 ENTRY BREAKDOWN:

Winners (9): Helio Castroneves, Scott Dixon, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Tony Kanaan, Juan Pablo Montoya, Simon Pagenaud, Will Power, Alexander Rossi, Takuma Sato

Rookies (3): RC Enerson, Pietro Fittipaldi, Scott McLaughlin

U.S. drivers (13): Marco Andretti, Ed Carpenter, Conor Daly, RC Enerson, Santino Ferrucci, Colton Herta, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Sage Karam, Charlie Kimball, JR Hildebrand, Josef Newgarden, Graham Rahal, Alexander Rossi

International drivers (22): Sebastien Bourdais, Helio Castroneves, Max Chilton, Simona De Silvestro, Scott Dixon, Marcus Ericsson, Pietro Fittipaldi, Jack Harvey, James Hinchcliffe, Ed Jones, Tony Kanaan, Dalton Kellett, Scott McLaughlin, Juan Pablo Montoya, Pato O’Ward, Simon Pagenaud, Alex Palou, Will Power, Felix Rosenqvist, Takuma Sato, Rinus VeeKay, Stefan Wilson

Engines (35): Chevrolet 18, Honda 17 (all cars use Dallara chassis and Firestone tires)

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIES
GMR GRAND PRIX
INDIANAPOLIS MOTOR SPEEDWAY ROAD COURSE
TEAM CHEVY ADVANCE
MAY 14-15

RACE 5 OF 2021 NTT INDYCAR SERIES:

DETROIT (May 12, 2021) – Will Power points to starting fast as the most definitive reason he’s been able to finish strong on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.

Power, driver of the No. 12 Verizon 5G Team Penske Chevrolet, has been proficient on the 14-turn, 2.439-mile circuit that incorporates portions of Turns 1 and 2 and the front straight of the famed oval. He has taken center stage in Victory Circle in 2015, ‘17, ’18 and October 2020 – each after starting from the pole – backed by 2.2-liter, twin-turbocharged, direct-injected V6 Chevrolet engine.

Power will join 12 other Team Chevy drivers who will seek to kick off NTT INDYCAR SERIES events this month at Indianapolis Motor Speedway with a victory in the 85-lap/207.3-mile GMR Grand Prix on Saturday, May 15. Two 45-minute practice sessions precede knockout qualifications Friday, May 14.

Team Chevy drivers have earned eight pole starts, led by Power’s five, and seven wins in the nine events since the inaugural race on the road course in 2014.

“Generally, if I qualify on pole at that track, we have a great shot of winning,” said Power, who has transferred a pole start to victory nine times with Chevrolet power. “You see different drivers win multiple races at different tracks. The Indy road course has been one of those for me.”

The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated reshaping the 2020 NTT INDYCAR SERIES schedule, with three races contested on the IMS road course. Power and Team Penske teammate Josef Newgarden were among the winners.

After Pato O’Ward broke through for his initial NTT INDYCAR SERIES victory — and the 90th for Chevrolet since it returned to engine manufacturer competition in 2012 — May 2 at Texas Motor Speedway in the No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet, Ed Carpenter Racing’s Rinus VeeKay is the odds-on favorite as the next first-time winner.

The Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, where the 2020 Series rookie of the year has two top-five finishes and a pole start in three races, is a likely venue. VeeKay, 20, driving the No. 21 Sonax/Autogeek Chevrolet, has had a solid start to the season with three top-10 finishes in the four races.

Joining the Chevrolet lineup are two-time Indianapolis 500 winner Juan Pablo Montoya in the No. 86 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet and Charlie Kimball driving the No. 11 Tresiba Chevrolet for AJ Foyt Racing.

Following the GMR Grand Prix, attention shifts to the 2.5-mile IMS oval for preparations for the 105th Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge on Sunday, May 30. In 2018, Power and Chevrolet swept the races on the road course and oval. The next year, Team Penske teammate Simon Pagenaud followed suit in his Chevrolet-powered race car.

“Chevrolet teams move from the high-banked Texas Motor Speedway oval to the exceptionally technical Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course this weekend for the GMR Grand Prix. The schedule presents challenges for drivers and Chevrolet engineers to get up to speed quickly for qualifying and the 85-lap race,” Chevrolet INDYCAR program manager Rob Buckner said. “Chevrolet has had great success in the nine races on the 2.439-mile road course and we will aim to start the Month of May at Indianapolis Motor Speedway with another victory and then turn our attention to ‘The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.’ ”

NBC will telecast the GMR Grand Prix live at 2:30 p.m. ET May 15. The 85-lap race will also be broadcast live on INDYCAR Radio Network affiliates, Sirius 211, XM 205, Indycar.com, and on the INDYCAR Mobile app powered by NTT DATA. Practice and live qualifications will stream on Peacock Premium.

Team Chevy will be represented by:
A.J. Foyt Enterprises
Dalton Kellett, No. 4 K-Line Insulators/AJ Foyt Racing
Charlie Kimball, No. 11 Tresiba/AJ Foyt Racing
Sebastien Bourdais, No. 14 ROKiT/AJ Foyt Racing
Arrow McLaren SP
Pato O’Ward, No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP
Felix Rosenqvist, No. 7 Vuse Arrow McLaren SP
Juan Pablo Montoya, No. 86 Arrow McLaren SP
Carlin
Max Chilton, No. 59 Gallagher Carlin
Ed Carpenter Racing
Conor Daly, No. 20 U.S. Air Force
Rinus VeeKay, No. 21 Sonax/Autogeek
Team Penske
Josef Newgarden, No. 2 Snap-on Team Penske
Scott McLaughlin, No. 3 PPG Team Penske
Will Power, No. 12 Verizon 5G Team Penske
Simon Pagenaud, No. 22 Menards Team Penske

Chevrolet IndyCar V6 Year-By-Year Results since 2012

2021 ­– 1 win, 1 pole in 4 races
Win – Pato O’Ward (Texas2). Pole – Pato O’Ward (Barber Motorsports Park)
2020 – 7 wins, 11 poles in 14 races
Wins – Simon Pagenaud (Iowa1); Josef Newgarden (Iowa2, St. Louis2, Indy RC2, St. Petersburg); Will Power (Mid-Ohio1, Indy RC3, St. Petersburg). Poles – Josef Newgarden (Texas, Road America1, Iowa2), Will Power (Indianapolis road course, St. Louis1, Mid-Ohio1, Indy RC3; St. Petersburg), Pato O’Ward (Road America2), Conor Daly (Iowa1), Rinus VeeKay (Indy road course October)
2019 – 9 wins, 9 poles in 17 races
Driver/owner championship (Josef Newgarden/Roger Penske); Indianapolis 500 win (Simon Pagenaud)
2018 – 6 wins, 9 poles in 17 races
Indianapolis 500 win (Will Power)
2017 – 10 wins, 11 poles in 17 races
Engine Manufacturer Championship; driver/owner titles (Josef Newgarden/Roger Penske)
2016 – 14 wins, 13 poles in 16 races
Engine Manufacturer Championship; driver/owner titles (Simon Pagenaud/Roger Penske)
2015 – 10 wins, 16 poles in 16 races
Engine Manufacturer Championship; driver/owner titles (Scott Dixon/Chip Ganassi);
Indianapolis 500 win (Juan Pablo Montoya). First manufacturer to capture all titles since Chevrolet returned to INDYCAR in 2012
2014 – 12 wins, 14 poles in 18 races
Engine Manufacturer Championship; driver/owner titles (Will Power/Roger Penske)
2013 – 10 wins, 11 poles in 19 races
Engine Manufacturer Championship; Indianapolis 500 win (Tony Kanaan)
2012 – 11 wins, 10 poles in 15 races
Engine Manufacturer Championship; driver/owner titles (Ryan Hunter-Reay/Michael Andretti)
Total – 90 wins, 100 earned poles in 153 races

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is now one of the world’s largest car brands, available in 79 countries with more than 3.2 million cars and trucks sold in 2020. Chevrolet models include electric and fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

Race weekend: Friday, May 14 – Saturday, May 15

Track: Indianapolis Motor Speedway, a 2.439-mile, 14-turn road course (clockwise)

Race distance: 85 laps / 207.3 miles

Push-to-pass parameters: 200 seconds of total time, with a maximum time of 20 seconds per activation.

Firestone tire allotment: Six sets primary, four sets alternate (Note: An seventh set of primary tires is available to any car fielding a rookie driver.)

Twitter: @IMS @IndyCar, #ThisIsMay, #IndyCar

Event website: www.ims.com

INDYCAR website: www.IndyCar.com

2020 race winner: Scott Dixon (No. 9 PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing Honda)

2020 NTT P1 Award winner: Will Power (No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet), 1:10.1779, 125.116 mph.

Qualifying lap record: Will Power, 1:07.7044, 129.687 mph, May 12, 2017 (Set in Round 3 of knockout qualifying)

NBC Sports race telecasts: Qualifying, 6 p.m. ET Friday, NBCSN (Same-day delay); GMR Grand Prix, 2 p.m. ET Saturday, NBC (live). Leigh Diffey is the play-by-play announcer for NBC’s coverage of the NTT INDYCAR SERIES, alongside analysts Townsend Bell and Paul Tracy.

Peacock Premium Live Streaming: All NTT INDYCAR SERIES practice sessions and qualifying will stream live on Peacock Premium, NBC’s direct-to-consumer livestreaming product.

INDYCAR Radio Network broadcasts: Mark Jaynes is the chief announcer alongside analyst Davey Hamilton. Nick Yeoman and Jake Query are the turn announcers. The GMR Grand Prix will air live on network affiliates, SiriusXM 205, indycar.com, indycarradio.com and the INDYCAR Mobile app powered by NTT DATA. All NTT INDYCAR SERIES practices and qualifying are available on SiriusXM 205, indycar.com and the INDYCAR Mobile app.

At-track schedule (all times local):

Friday, May 14 (All times are local)
9:30-10:15 a.m. NTT INDYCAR SERIES practice, Peacock Premium
1-1:45 p.m. NTT INDYCAR SERIES practice, Peacock Premium
4:30 p.m. Qualifying for the NTT P1 Award (three rounds of NTT INDYCAR SERIES knockout qualifications), Peacock Premium (Live)

Saturday, May 15
10:45-11:15 a.m. NTT INDYCAR SERIES warmup, Peacock Premium
2 p.m. NBC on air
2:39 p.m. “Drivers, start your engines”
2:45 p.m. GMR Grand Prix (85 laps/207.3 miles), NBC (Live)

Race Notes:

• The GMR Grand Prix will be the 10th INDYCAR SERIES event conducted on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s road course. Scott Dixon, Josef Newgarden, Simon Pagenaud and Will Power are the only drivers to win on the IMS road course. Pagenaud won the GMR Grand Prix in 2014, 2016 and 2019, Power won the GMR Grand Prix in 2015, 2017 and 2018 and the second race of the Harvest Grand Prix doubleheader in 2020. Dixon won the 2020 GMR Grand Prix, while Newgarden won the first race of the 2020 Harvest GP doubleheader.
• Pagenaud, Power, Felix Rosenqvist and Sebastian Saavedra are the only drivers to have won the pole position in the GMR Grand Prix. Saavedra claimed the pole in 2014, Power in 2015, 2017, 2018 and 2020, Pagenaud in 2016 and Rosenqvist in 2019. Power and Rinus VeeKay won the NTT P1 Award in the Harvest Grand Prix doubleheader last October.
• Four NTT P1 Award winners have won the GMR Grand Prix from the pole: Power in 2015, 2017 and 2018 and Pagenaud in 2016. Power also won the second Harvest GP race from pole in 2020.
• Nine drivers have competed in every INDYCAR SERIES race on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course – Marco Andretti, Dixon, James Hinchcliffe, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Newgarden, Pagenaud, Power, Graham Rahal and Takuma Sato. All but Andretti are entered this year.
• Dixon has finished first or second in the last four GMR Grand Prix at Indianapolis, including last year’s win – his first on the IMS road course. Dixon, who won at Texas on May 1 for his 51st career win, leads the point standings entering the event for the second straight year.
• Rookies Romain Grosjean, Jimmie Johnson and Scott McLaughlin will race NTT INDYCAR SERIES cars on Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s road course for the first time this weekend. Johnson is no stranger to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, though. He won the Brickyard 400 – the NASCAR Cup race previously held on the oval — four times.
• Twenty-three of the drivers entered in the event have competed in INDYCAR races on the IMS road course. Eleven entered drivers have led laps in the GMR Grand Prix: Power 210, Pagenaud 68, Dixon 66, Graham Rahal 36, Newgarden 25, Ryan Hunter-Reay 18, Rosenqvist 15, James Hinchcliffe 4, Alexander Rossi 2, Marcus Ericsson 1 and Jack Harvey.

FORT WORTH, Texas (Sunday, May 2, 2021) – Pato O’Ward’s time is now.

O’Ward broke through for his first career NTT INDYCAR SERIES victory in the No. 5 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet, winning the XPEL 375 on Sunday evening at Texas Motor Speedway. O’Ward, who started fourth, passed two-time series champion Josef Newgarden with 24 laps remaining in the 248-lap race and pulled away to a 1.2443-second victory over Newgarden’s No. 2 XPEL Team Penske Chevrolet.

The win came after five top-three finishes – including three as runner-up – since O’Ward became a full-time driver in the series in 2019, including third Saturday in the Genesys 300 on the 1.5-mile oval. The site also has significance for Mexican O’Ward, who went to middle and high school and has lived in San Antonio.

“Finally!” O’Ward said. “That was long race, but we had so much pace in the Arrow McLaren SP No. 5. We got the job done today, man. I couldn’t be happier for a group of guys. It’s Texas. It’s very close to my heart. Many Mexicans were out there in the grandstands, so thank you guys so much.”

O’Ward became the first Mexican winner of an INDYCAR SERIES race since Adrian Fernandez in 2004 on the 2-mile oval at Auto Club Speedway. This also was McLaren’s first win in INDYCAR since April 22, 1979, when Johnny Rutherford swept a doubleheader at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Graham Rahal finished third in the No. 15 Fleet Cost & Care Honda. Six-time series champion Scott Dixon, winner of the Genesys 300 on Saturday night, finished fourth after starting from the pole in the No. 9 PNC Bank Chip Ganassi Racing Honda.

Colton Herta bounced back from an early exit Saturday night due to mechanical failure to finish fifth in the No. 26 Gainbridge Honda.

Dixon kept the series points lead. O’Ward jumped to second in the standings, 22 behind.

“Huge congrats to Pato,” Dixon said. “I was watching from back a few spots there, and what he did there at the end was a tremendous drive, especially against one of the best guys in the field.

“Hopefully he calms down a little bit and doesn’t make it too often,” Dixon joked about O’Ward.

While Dixon and teammate Alex Palou were the only leaders Saturday night with three lead changes among them, there were nine leaders and 12 lead changes tonight in a contest that shifted from tactical fuel strategy to all-out speed over the closing laps.

With 100 laps to go, Dixon, Rahal, O’Ward and 2014 series champion Will Power closed to within one second of each other, packing closely to try and save fuel while whittling the number of pit stops needed from four to three.
Dixon and Rahal peeled off for their final pit stop on Lap 186, followed by O’Ward on Lap 187 and Power on Lap 188. Team Penske President Tim Cindric, who serves as Newgarden’s race strategist, decided to keep his driver on track until Lap 189.

It was a deft call by Cindric. Newgarden produced blistering in and out laps around his stop and returned to the track in second behind Takuma Sato in the No. 30 Panasonic Mi-Jack Honda, who had not made his final stop.

Then the last of three caution periods started on Lap 190 when the right rear wheel of the No. 7 Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet driven by Felix Rosenqvist worked free from the wheel hub assembly in Turn 3. Rosenqvist returned to his pit box safely for service.

On the ensuing restart on Lap 197, Newgarden was content to let Sato lead for awhile to ensure he had plenty of fuel for an all-out dash to the checkered. Newgarden’s patience ended on Lap 202 when he rocketed past two-time and reigning Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge winner Sato for the lead.

O’Ward then pulled closer and began to stalk Newgarden. On Lap 225, he tried to pass Newgarden for the lead with a daring outside move in Turn 1 but was parried. But O’Ward sealed his powerful deal by diving inside Newgarden for the lead in Turn 3 on the same lap and began to pull away, never trailing thereafter. He averaged 169.360 mph in the victory.

“We were in the catbird seat there, for sure, and just did not have the speed at the end,” Newgarden said. “I don’t know what it was.

“We’ll figure it out. But we did a great job. I was really proud of the team. They stuck to it.”

The complexion of the race changed on Lap 1 before the 24-car field arrived in Turn 1.

Pietro Fittipaldi’s No. 51 Nurtec ODT Honda hit the rear of Sebastien Bourdais’ No. 14 ROKiT/AJ Foyt Racing Chevrolet while the back of the pack compressed while approaching the green flag at the start-finish line, triggering a melee that involved seven cars and eliminated six.

Involved in the incident besides Fittipaldi and Bourdais were Conor Daly (No. 59 Carlin Chevrolet), Ed Jones (No. 18 SealMaster Honda), Tony Kanaan (No. 48 The American Legion Honda), Dalton Kellett (No. 4 K-Line Insulators/AJ Foyt Racing Chevrolet) and Alexander Rossi (No. 27 AutoNation/NAPA AUTO PARTS Honda). All the drivers in the incident were unhurt, and Kanaan was the only to continue in the race.

Daly took the wildest ride in the crash. He tried to follow James Hinchcliffe in the No. 29 #ShiftToGreen Honda through a hole in the chaos, but that escape route quickly closed. The ensuing contact turned over Daly’s car, and it slid down the track on the roll hoop and revolutionary Aeroscreen, turning right-side-up when it touched the infield grass. Daly climbed from the car without assistance.

“We found the hole,” Daly said. “Hinch got right through it. I tried to follow my pal through there, and the the 4 car (Kellett) looks like they caught whoever else was also crashing on the inside, and the two giant cars came (together), and I was in the middle.

“On our Bingo card of terrible things to have happened to us this year, I don’t know what’s going to be next. I really hope we can just start turning things around. It’s been a rough start. But I’m good. I’m all right.”

The series shifts to Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the next two races. The GMR Grand Prix is scheduled for Saturday, May 15 on the IMS road course, with the 105th Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge set for Sunday, May 30 on the Brickyard’s world-famous oval.

CHEVROLET RACING IN NTT INDYCAR SERIES
XPEL 375
TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY, FORT WORTH, TEXAS
POST RACE ZOOM CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
MAY 2, 2021

PATO O’WARD, NO. 5 ARROW MCLAREN SP CHEVROLET, WINNER OF TODAY’S RACE AND JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 2 XPEL TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET WHO FINISHED IN 2ND, MET POST RACE WITH MEDIA VIA ZOOM:

THE MODERATOR: We have been joined by our race winner, Pato O’Ward, his first win in his 26th INDYCAR SERIES start. He made a pass for the lead on lap 225. He is now second in points and Thursday is his 22nd birthday.
Welcome, Pato. How fun was today for you?
PATO O’WARD: Yeah, it was very fun today. I feel like we truly earned our win today. I knew we had a very, very quick car. It’s just very, very tough to pass. Everybody kind of got boxing in the same strategy. Everything had to be done out on track. I knew I had to keep the tires under me, attack whenever I had the fuel to do it.
But the Chevy mileage was great. I really have to thank the whole Arrow McLaren SP No. 5 Chevy crew. They gave me a very strong car, something that I could truly attack whenever I had to. It was some great fun. I’m very proud of what we all accomplished as a group today.

THE MODERATOR: We’ll start with questions from the media.
Q. After this weekend, we saw one victory for Honda and one victory for Chevy. How do you see this engine fight looking at the Indianapolis 500?
PATO O’WARD: I think we’re in a good position. Talking about the Chevy, I am in a Chevy, I don’t know what the Honda feels like because I’ve never really driven it. From the looks of it, it looks like everything is very fair. It’s very spaced out. I feel like there’s a very good mix of Chevys and Hondas fighting at the front. Around the middle it’s also very mixed.
I think we’re going to see a very good fight in Indy. I’m not quite sure how it’s going to be. I can’t really tell you because everybody hasn’t really let loose yet. We’ll see on Fast Friday.
I’m confident that Chevy has done some improvements to help us out at this year’s Indy 500. As everybody knows, that’s the crown jewel. Everybody wants to win that race, including us.

Q. Did the first win feel like you thought it would feel?
PATO O’WARD: Very special. Very special for sure. It’s really cool to do it in a place that’s very close to my heart, very close to home. Texas is the closest that I will ever have to racing in Mexico. Hopefully we can change that in the future.
I lived here just four hours south of here in San Antonio for many years. I grew up there a lot of my teenage years. I love coming here.
It’s a tough track. It’s not easy at all. But I think it’s a great place to do it. Lots of my family was here. It’s really cool to share this moment with them. It’s just cool to get it out of the way for the rest of the season, to try and rack up as many more as we can. If we can’t take that, we take a second or a third.
We’re here for the long haul. We want to try to challenge for this championship and want a chance whenever we end up in California at the end of September.

Q. As soon as the race ended Zak tweeted a deal is a deal, see you in Abu Dhabi. I’m wondering if that’s crossed your mind at all, that he owes you, has to pay up?
PATO O’WARD: Yes, he’s going to pay up (laughter).

Q. You’re always very confident entering a race. Today you appeared to be a little more confident than normal. What was it about today where you felt confident that this could be the day?
PATO O’WARD: Man, something about today just felt — I was very calm going into the race. I knew I had a good car under me. I knew that if I was just patient.
In the beginning, it was definitely a struggle because Palou and Dixon were leaving us. It was either try and get by the people, try to catch up, or kind of stay there. Obviously the yellows played into our favor to close everyone back up.
But, yeah, I just feel like everything aligned today. The pit stops were fantastic. The car was very well-balanced. I was able to attack. I didn’t feel like I was in defensive mode. I felt like if I was let loose, I could attack and I could get the job done. Just definitely a lot harder wherever everybody is kind of on the same mileage of tires.
Honestly the best option or the best chance to go forward is in the restarts, as you guys probably saw. Last restart was probably what put me in position to win this race.

Q. Could you go over the race-winning pass in turn three. How much did you time that?
PATO O’WARD: Yeah, I was looking at what Josef was doing, so I was able to follow somewhat closely to him. Man, I have so much respect for him because he races me so clean, he’s such a great competitor. He definitely allowed us to have a good battle in the end and not put both of us in the wall. He’s a very smart competitor. He’s a great champion. Probably one of the guys you would wish to be racing for the lead of a race or to win a race, yeah. It’s definitely really cool.

Q. You started off your journey in America in Indy Pro 2000. You were out of open-wheel for an entire year in 2017. Won Indy Lights. Out in 2019. How much more does this win mean to you given where your journey started in America with Team Pelfrey?
PATO O’WARD: It feels well earned. It’s a race win that no one can take away from us by saying, You won it because you were lucky. I truly feel like we earned it based on pace, pit stops, and the job that I did on track. Without the overtakes that we did, we probably wouldn’t have had a chance.
It feels really good that we truly earned this. I couldn’t be happier for the group of guys.

Q. What was the first thing you thought of when you crossed the finish line?
PATO O’WARD: Just like finally (laughter). Man, the last like 15 laps, I was just enjoying, enjoying the ride. Yeah, I mean, I don’t know how else to explain it. My donuts were like not the best, but I really wanted to do donuts (smiling).
But, yeah, I just felt really calm. When we crossed the finish line, I just felt really proud of all the hard work that has gone into this off-season. Many hours go into this, and we’re all here to win. There’s a lot more lows than highs in racing unfortunately. But the highs are very high. We all compete for this moment.
We’re going to take it in. But we’ve got a long way to go in the championship. The month of May is coming up, going to be very busy. We need to be on top of our game. We’re going to try to rack up as many more wins as we can. If we can’t do that, score as many points as we can.

Q. What’s the first thing you’re going to say to Zak Brown when he calls you or you call him?
PATO O’WARD: Where is my F1 test? I want McLaren.

Q. Can you talk us through the lap 225 pass. How serious were you when you tried round the outside at turn one? How did you manage to maintain your momentum into turn three?
PATO O’WARD: Yeah, Josef was riding not as low as my car liked to ride. I was just watching what he was doing. I was hanging back because I had to hit a number of fuel. It’s a lot harder whenever you’re in clean air.
Once they let me loose and said, You know what to do, is where I really closed it up. I think it took maybe one or two laps. But he’s someone I can really trust when I’m racing. Around this place, you’re going 210, 220 plus miles an hour, you need someone that can race you hard but clean. Josef is someone that has always raced me very, very clean. It’s someone that I highly respect a lot. Honestly, it was really cool to have the battle of the win with him.

Q. INDYCAR says you’re the first Mexican driver to win in the series since Adrian Fernandez in 2004. What does that mean? Do you know Adrian at all?
PATO O’WARD: Man, I admire Adrian a lot. It’s very special to me to represent my country. I’m the only Mexican driver racing here. I’m a competitive being. I like to win. I like to be at the front. I like to compete. I don’t think there’s anything better than putting your flag as high as you can. I think Dixon will say that about his country, so on.
I’m very proud of what we accomplished and really happy that we got this all together in a way.

Q. Give us a brief background. How long did you live in Texas?
PATO O’WARD: I lived in Mexico for the first 11 years of my life. I went to middle school and high school in San Antonio, Texas. It’s honestly very, very close to Monterrey, Mexico. Just three hours from the border from Mexico. Anyways, I moved there.
I just moved to Indy a year ago to be closer to the team. I enjoy spending time with them. They’re like a second family. San Antonio, Texas, does feel very much like a home to me. That’s basically how I ended up going to San Antonio.

Q. When you get the personal McLaren from Zak, what color are you going to get that car in?
PATO O’WARD: Probably some crazy color. I won’t ask him for a normal one. I want a limited edition.

Q. Do you think this win might help INDYCAR land that race in Mexico that you have been trying to do for a number of years?
PATO O’WARD: I sure hope so. I don’t think just one win will do it. I think if we’re consistently championship contenders, if we win a couple more, I think that will definitely help the chances of a bit more. That’s the goal.
I always tell everybody, If we go back to Mexico, it’s going to be a sold out event and it’s going to be awesome. We just have to get into the process as soon as we can.

Q. Early in your career you were aiming for Formula 1, the Red Bull program didn’t really pan out. After this race you said you love INDYCAR racing. Do you still have a desire to someday go back to F1 or is this your home now?
PATO O’WARD: Man, I mean, like I said, my heart’s with INDYCAR. It’s just great racing and it’s so, so competitive. I think for a driver there is nothing harder in the world. I think many drivers can agree with me that have come from Formula 1 to INDYCAR, back to Formula 1.
You know what, Formula 1 is the peak of technology. Everybody wants to go there. If the opportunity ever came by Zak, he said there’s a seat open, I want you in my team, I’d be pretty dumb not to take it because it would just be a crazy opportunity. They don’t come often.
Right now I’m focused on the job that I have right now in INDYCAR. I want to make the best of it.

Q. How much momentum does this give you going into the month of May given you’re joined by Montoya for the entire month?
PATO O’WARD: I think it’s great momentum to roll into the month of May. Things can go from high to low in a matter of seconds. We need to keep our head in it. If there’s a time to push, it’s now. We just need to be continuing to be consistent, qualify up front. That will make our lives a lot easier during the races.
It’s just so competitive. You guys saw, when someone is dominant or fast in one place, they go to the next place and they might be a bit further back or strong again. You never know. It’s so competitive.
I just think we have to continue with the mentality that we have. When we have the opportunity, we take it. If we don’t, we maximize what we’ve got.

Q. Drivers from Mexico bring their entire country with them as far as fans. You can see that with Daniel Suarez and you. Does that give you any more pride when you get a win like this?
PATO O’WARD: Yeah, I’ve said it in many interviews. I feel like there is nothing better than the Mexican fans. There is so much life and energy, especially for their fellow countrymen. It’s really cool.
We always want to see more. I feel like we have so much potential to grow in the country of Mexico, South America, with all the Latins. I feel like this is obviously a step in the right direction. But nowhere close where I feel like it could be.

Q. Question about the gun salute.)
PATO O’WARD: I shot like one time a rifle, but just once. Whenever they gave me a pistol, it took me a while to clock them or whatever. But it’s cool, man. It was some fun. I think I did it like four times or something.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you so much for joining us today.

THE MODERATOR: Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the post race press conference. We are joined today by the driver of the No. 2 XPEL Team Penske Chevrolet, Josef Newgarden, who finished second place in today’s event.
Josef, great finish for you today. Tell us about your race.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, it was a decent day for us. Can’t be too disappointed with the second place. Obviously we were in the catbird seat there at the end. Felt like it was going to be possible to get a win today.
The only thing I was worried about, just seemed like we were lacking some speed for whatever reason. Pato’s Chevy seemed to be performing a little bit better than my Chevy. Regardless, with Chevy in Victory Lane, it’s a good day.
We had great fuel mileage, great reliability, which are always qualities we get from Chevrolet. Pretty proud about that. Happy to have XPEL on the car, with them being the title sponsor.
A lot of good positives, but just short at the end of the day.

THE MODERATOR: We’ll take questions.
Q. How much confidence does this give you going into the month of May, going to the Speedway for the Indy 500?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, we feel pretty good about things. Felt positive coming here. Didn’t have the weekend we could have. But I think at the end we definitely feel pretty positive about what we’re doing. Then Indianapolis, same deal, pretty happy with what we’re going to be bringing there.
Yeah, excited to get to May. It’s finally here. We can settle in now and try to make the most of it.

Q. This result is obviously as a result of some really hard work by the team. How rewarding is it to pick up the podium and have XPEL at the race?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, it was great. I saw them in victory circle when I got to see Pato. They were pretty pumped to have a fun finish to the race. It was definitely more thrilling than it could have been. So excited they were here. Excited they were on our car. I think their support was great. Good second place, couple podiums now. We just got to keep going.

Q. The second-place finish for the championship, how much does this mean for you going forward to try to recover from Barber?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, it’s a good day. Obviously we’re pretty early, so it’s hard to take too much stock into where we’re at now. But we’re definitely — I think everybody in the championship is in the fight. It’s early enough to do anything right now.
Yeah, but I got to have days like this. This is always good.

Q. I know Penske hasn’t won yet, but four runner-ups with the team. Is it getting happy your guys are close or increasingly more frustrating?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Not frustrating yet. I mean, we’re there. We’re definitely in the mix, which is the first step. So I think we stay in the mix, we’re going to get some wins knocked off. We just got to stay focused on that. Feeling good about things so far.

Q. St. Pete last year you were praising Pato about how your battles were together. We have a pair of 21-year-old winners this season. Do you feel like the future of the series is now? Is this the wave the series has been needing?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think it’s definitely a good wave. We seem to get it, I don’t know, I don’t know what’s cycle is, every four, five years. But there’s definitely a good wave at the moment.
I think everybody has been pretty high on Colton and Pato. I’ve been definitely very high on Pato. Not surprised to see him get a win. Both him and McLaren are very strong contenders.
Yeah, you have a little of everything. Guys in the middle, like me, middle of the road. You have some veterans and some really good young blood. It’s a good time. There’s a lot of talent.

Q. What did you think of the aero changes this weekend, the impact it had on the races?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I would agree with Graham. You got to take the positives. Everyone has put a tremendous amount of work into this. Both the series, the track, everybody involved, the teams trying to help out with feedback.
I think it was an improvement from last year, as well. I agree. It was racier. People followed a lot closer, less dropoff. I think it was pretty close to being good. You’re just a little hand tied here with the one-lane track, to be honest. If we could get more lanes, we could get more usage out of the track, I think you’d have a much racier race.
A lot of what happened today was it turned into a fuel mileage situation. There’s not much you can do about that. Whenever it gets to that point, everyone is going to take it up, you saw nearly the whole field trying to fuel. You get into one of those situations with a caution at the beginning that creates it, you just can’t do much about it. Everyone is going to try to race.
I thought at the end when it got racy again, it was definitely a good improvement.

Q. What did you both of you see, what caused the wreck behind you guys? Seemed like the guys involved said it was guys checking up towards the front.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, I noticed it. I’m not surprised. There was a small checkup where I was at in sixth. I have a pretty good view of the first and second row.
It doesn’t take much. The smallest checkup can turn into a really big effect down the line. I think that’s what happened today. I noticed just a little bauble. Everyone kind of adjusts, but I think people probably overreacted in the back.
It’s unfortunate. You got to have the thing silky smooth when you’re at the front starting these races. If it’s not 100% smooth the way everyone is brought to the line, it can get really tricky at the back.

Q. Josef, you’ve had some ups and downs over the past four races. What are you taking from all of this heading into the month of May?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think there’s plenty of positives. St. Pete was a strong weekend. I think I would say this weekend was fairly strong. We’ve not been world beaters on either of them, but we’re thoroughly in the fight, in the mix.
We’ve been in position to win races the last two weekends. I said this earlier, but that’s step one. You put yourself in position, you keep doing that. You do that enough times, it all starts falling into place. That’s the theory at least.
I feel positive about where we’re at. I know there’s been a tremendous amount of work from our team to try and up our game at all places. I think we’re feeling some of those effects now.
Indy, we obviously want to have the biggest effect from those efforts. I think we’re all pretty hopeful, excited to get stuck into the month of May and make the most of it.

Q. First time we had back-to-back races on two separate days at Texas Motor Speedway. How did it work out for you physically, with the team? Did you like the concept? Should we move forward with it?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I’m indifferent. I don’t know if I like it one way or the other. I like a single-day show here at Texas. You got two this weekend. I don’t feel one way or the other about it. I liked it when it was a solo weekend, and two this weekend. I don’t know how to say much more than that.

Q. Josef, how confident were you that the strategy T.C. had cooked up for you was going to be able to work and get you to Victory Lane?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Strategy was sound. We were saving more fuel than anybody today, just going that little bit longer which enabled us to do what we were doing. We were kind of working towards the back end of this race all day, kind of the boring way to hit it, but it’s effective.
I just didn’t have pace at the end. I had positioning. I for whatever reason didn’t have the pace. I don’t know. I was pretty flat out, but just didn’t have the pace.
Yeah, I was really positive on the approach. I always am. I feel confident in what we’re doing. I always feel big confidence in Tim and the boys on pit lane. They crush it pretty much every time. There’s no lacking of confidence there. We just didn’t have quite enough at the end.
For our side, we learned a lot from Scott and the 3 car, his engineer J.B. In contrast to what Graham is saying, it’s nice to have multiple cars. Three of us were struggling last night. Massive issues all three of us were fighting, Will, Simon, myself. The 3 car looked like they were on an island, pretty happy.
When those situations arise, it’s just copy, paste, simple as that. It goes around sometimes. It was a big improvement for us. Our race car was really good today. Super happy with that. Just lacking speed. I don’t know where the speed was. But the race car felt very good.
Yeah, it’s nice when you have teammates to lean on like that and definitely learn something from the first race going into the second.

THE MODERATOR: We’ll let Josef Newgarden Go.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Thank you.

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