Perfection and Pagenaud: Penske’s bid for 21st Indy 500 success
- Archie O’Reilly
- 1 hour ago
- 7 min read
At the hands of Josef Newgarden, Team Penske are chasing Indianapolis 500 history this month as the driver of the No.2 Chevy bids to become the first driver in history to win the Greatest Spectacle in Racing in three successive seasons.
The Roger Penske-owned outfit is looking to win a 21st Indy 500 - of which Will Power, driver of the No.12 Chevy, also has one - and replicate a display from 2024 which also saw the team lock out the front row for only the second time in the history of the race.
The pursuit of perfection continues for Penske at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway…
Can you be “perfect” at Indianapolis?
Speaking about his consecutive Indy 500 wins - coming after a 12-year wait of anguish for the two-time series champion - Newgarden has said things need to go “perfectly” in order to achieve success at the Speedway.
But can you ever actually be perfect at Indy?
“Maybe ‘perfect’ is the wrong word,” Newgarden said during Penske’s annual Fast Friday media availability. “I don’t know that you can have a ‘perfect’ day any day. But you have to be as close to it as possible.
“The way I would sum it up, Indy magnifies the team effort more than anywhere. It’s abundantly true here at the Speedway. Everybody has to pull forward and really perform in an excellent way. I don’t know how you win this race without the complete team.
“It’s the same thing sitting on the pole. It just magnifies the team effort through and through. On race day, you can have all the ingredients, you can feel like you have the winning car underneath you, you can feel really good about the moves you’re making, but if everything is not complete from a team side, you will not win the race.
“It just has to be almost as close to perfect as possible. That’s what I’ve tried to continue to repeat, is that it’s such a team effort here. It is everywhere but it’s magnified at Indy to another level that we don’t see for the rest of the year.”
There is one man who knows better than anybody what it takes to win the Indy 500 for Penske: Rick Mears. The great American driver won four Indy 500s with Penske and remains only one of four men to be within the exclusive four-time winners club.
“Having the right team and the right equipment and the tools you need to get the job done is what it takes - everything being in place at the right time, no mistakes,” said Mears, present with the team on Fast Friday. “The old saying is you’re only as strong as your weakest link and try to control all the variables and then have a lot of lady luck with you also.
“You control your own destiny to a point but there’s a little lady luck there too. It’s just all got to come together on the day. It’s like I’ve always said: you never know about this place until you see the chequered flag.
“Somebody asked me: ‘After your first win, when did you realise you had it sewed up?’ And I said once I came off of Turn 4 heading for the chequered flag - not until I got by pit end because once I got by pit end, then I knew if all the wheels fell off the thing I could slide the rest of the way. But that’s as soon as I let myself feel I had it won.”
Newgarden’s quest for the three-peat
While Newgarden is on the brink of a historic feat if he can become the first driver to ever win the Indy 500 back-to-back-to-back, there is a sense of calm emanating from him.
“I’m just happy to be here,” he said. “You have no idea. I know that sounds like a line just to state but I wake up happy. It feels like Christmas. It’s just the best. I love living here for three weeks. I almost wish it was longer.
“It’s definitely one of my favourite times of the year, if not the favourite. It just gets better when you win it. I feel like I’m already looking back on my life while still living it. I know we’re going to look back on this and feel so cool about what we were able to do.”
Newgarden knows what is on the line but that is not taking away from his processes.
“We have an opportunity to set history next weekend, which would be tremendous,” he said. “I’m not focused on that. It’s circumstantial in a lot of ways. We all want to win the race and that’s what we’re focused on. If we win the race, everything falls in line.
“But we’ve just got to focus on doing our job every year and enjoy that process. That’s what I’ve brought myself back to the last two seasons.”
For Mears, the feeling was that success came from not getting overly caught up in the prestige of Indy and allowing pressure to build.
“Treat it as another race,” he said. “If I had two [wins] or whatever, it didn’t matter. Each year you go into this race as a new race and you’re here to win it. It had nothing to do with whether it was No.2 or No.3 or No.4. That helps keep it just as another race.
“This is Indianapolis - it’s almost impossible to keep it as another race. But that’s the frame of mind I tried to keep when we were running. That way I’m not pressured into doing something that I shouldn’t do.”
That view from Mears resonates with Newgarden.
“The odds of us winning it three times in a row are astronomical,” Newgarden said. “So what’s the stress then? Just go out and enjoy the day. The other way to look at it is, to Rick’s point, this is still Indy.
“You feel the same stress every year when you show up here regardless of the circumstance. This is a 12-month process, building these cars, strategising for what we’re going to be doing. You want to perform every year for the team. All of us feel that pressure on race day.
“I don’t know that changes, whether it’s the first time or the fourth time. When you’re here for many years, you either end up enjoying that pressure or you let it break you down. I enjoy the pressure. It’s fun to go and perform when it’s really going to matter. It’s easy going.”
Pagenaud mentoring McLaughlin again
Of the current Penske lineup, Scott McLaughlin - the pole-sitter in last year’s front row lockout - is the only driver not to have won the Indy 500. But a sixth-place run last year was his best in four outings at the Speedway, with McLaughlin then winning his first two oval races in a significant breakthrough later in the 2024 season.
As was the case - initially secretively - last year, McLaughlin again has the mentorship of Simon Pagenaud in his corner.
Pagenaud, a series champion and winner of the 2019 Indy 500 for Penske, has been sidelined for almost two years since a heavy practice crash at Mid-Ohio. But his support for McLaughlin throughout the year allows him to maintain a link to the sport.
“We’re talking the whole season,” McLaughlin said. “Simon has been really helpful in a lot of ways - just how I look at things outside the box. A detriment to my own career throughout the years is I haven’t been as intricate with looking at little details.
“Simon is the professor in that regard. He strives for perfection in a lot of ways in how he sets up his car and what he feels. It’s allowing me to look into more details and the way I look at myself and the driving, the lines and what I’m doing with the weight jacker and bars.
“It’s really helped accelerate my progress [at Indy] And I really am enjoying working with a friend as well.”
Pagenaud spent seven years with Penske between 2015 and 2021, winning the title in his second season. Team president Tim Cindric has left the door open for Pagenaud to work with the team in a non-driving capacity should he be unable to compete again.
“Simon is always welcome within our team,” Cindric said. “We spent some time together [on Thursday] night. Simon has a lot going on on his own, beyond our team. I know Simon has been offered some really good things to do but there’s only so much that Simon really wants to do.”
McLaughlin first hinted at Pagenaud’s involvement without naming him after taking pole at the Speedway last year. By the end of race week, Pagenaud was on McLaughlin’s timing stand.
“He can be a benefit for anybody around this place,” Cindric added. “I don’t think there’s any limit in terms of what he does. But at the same time, he wants to be productive. Just hanging around probably isn’t what he wants to do either.
“We have a pretty good balance and we’re always open to him within our team. We always look at all the drivers that have been here as part of our team. That’s what makes us special.”
McLaughlin has built a catalogue of his own experience across his early years at the Speedway. In 2024, he was able to run at the head of the pack more than he had done in his first three Indy 500s.
“Every time you come here, you just take that next little step,” he said. “I’m still leaning on [teammates] a little bit throughout that stage. Having the experience of running up front last year was crucial for me in my development and how I learned from that.
“I feel like I’ve judged on what I did wrong and what I did right last year and trying to mould into a better driver as we work forward. The team has worked so hard. We were fast last year but we haven’t rested on our laurels and we’ve worked even harder to be better again. That’s what it takes in IndyCar.”
