Explaining the Indy 500 tumult, Team Penske scandal and firings, and what’s important

The IBJ Podcast with Mason King

The week between qualifying for the Indianapolis 500 and the actual race is usually pretty quiet from a news perspective. But there’s nothing usual about the last week in this year’s Month of May. Major penalties assessed to two cars owned by Team Penske—including the car driven by two-time defending champion Josef Newgarden—inflamed long-running concerns about Roger Penske’s ownership of both the IndyCar Series and arguably its most successful team.

In an extraordinary press conference on Monday, IndyCar President Doug Boles announced that he and another Penske executive decided that harsher penalties were warranted in an effort to protect the integrity of the Indy 500. Their decision, he said, was made without the input of their boss, Roger Penske. Two days later, Team Penske announced something that would have been unthinkable before the 2024 season--that it was parting ways with three of the team’s top executives. That included President Tim Cindric, long considered to be Penske’s successor in the racing part of his automobile empire. The departures have been widely reported as firings.

Boles dropped another bombshell late on Wednesday. He revealed that IndyCar has been exploring the creation of an independent governing body beyond Penske’s control to officiate the series without the appearance of bias.

If you live in the central Indiana media market, these rapid-fire announcements might have been bewildering. You’ve heard references to “cheating” and “scandal.” You’ve heard that the smoking gun for the qualifying penalties was something called an “attenuator” that had been illegally modified in some way. You’ve heard that all of these developments are a “big deal” for Penske, and therefore the series. If you don’t follow IndyCar religiously, this week’s podcast gives you the relevant background and serves as a primer on which elements are important. Our guest is John Oreovicz, a journalist and author who has covered IndyCar for three decades.