They say that the mistake that President Richard Nixon made was getting caught which resulted in the Watergate Scandal that took place in the US back in 1972 and his eventual resignation from office. Maybe that is Josef Newgarden’s dilemma. He got caught illegally using the Push to Pass (P2P) and there is good reason to think that if he hadn’t, he would have kept using the software manipulation by Team Penske in the future rounds of the 2024 NTT IndyCar Series! While Newgarden has fronted in person to the media, it leaves a number of unanswered questions particularly why he hasn’t been sacked for bringing the sport and his employer into disrepute.
The Series disqualified Newgarden from the season-opening race in St. Petersburg, which he had won, along with disqualifying teammate Scott McLaughlin from third and penalising Will Power with the loss of 10-points, after determining Team Penske, the team owned by IndyCar Series owner Roger Penske, violated the series’ push-to-pass rules.
This irregularity was discovered at the second round in Long Beach when officials found that the three Penske cars were able to bypass the software restriction and use the P2P at anytime of their choosing, when officially it is restricted, by officials, to determined stages within a race. The P2P system gives a driver and extra ‘shot’ of approximately 50hp.
Newgarden’s admission of not knowing the rules is disturbing. What athlete at an elite level is unaware of the rules of their sport? As Newgarden himself says, “It is my responsibility to know the rules and regulations at all points, and to make sure I get that right…. You cannot make a mistake at this level in that situation. There is no room for it.”
The question asked of Newgarden from Nathan Brown (Indianapolis Star) was telling. “Your three pushes of P2P on the restarts at St Pete’s, 3 seconds, 2.4 and 3.6 second… did you feel those instances of P2P?” They are quite long instances of added acceleration. Not only was Newgarden aware of it but his rivals must have been aware as well.
Watching the Sky Sport coverage of the latest round at Barber Motorsport Park in Alabama was particularly compelling at the beginning with numerous driver interviews about the scandal. Essentially Colton Herta has called Newgarden a liar, Scott Dixon doubted the Penske explanation of how this irregularity came about and Newgarden said he hadn’t talked to any driver leading up to the start of the race at Barber. (or maybe drivers are not talking to him).
As for Scott McLaughlin, we have to take his explanation on face value that he was unaware of the situation. However, in his singular use of the P2P, he must have known that something was amiss. To his credit, he only used it once and he has stated, unlike Newgarden, that he knows the rules.
The thing I struggle with IndyCar is how can a driver, in this case McLaughlin, can go from zero to hero in less than a week, from losing a podium, Series points and receiving a fine to winning the next round. My instinct says that this wouldn’t happen in Formula One as the penalty would also have grid positions deducted, if not a stand down of a Grand Prix and applied to all three Team Penske drivers. This is nothing to do with McLaughlin, rather the IndyCar Series ruling.
Credit must go to IndyCar for exposing and dealing with this scandal/cheating. It is not a good look and must be embarrassing for both Series and team owner Roger Penske. He has an employee who has ‘owned’ the mistake. It will be interesting to see what happens internally within Team Penske.
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