Austin Cindric, Team Penske drivers focused on Coke 600 after tumultuous week for organization
CONCORD, N.C. — His father among those let go by car owner Roger Penske after the second high-profile rules violation in about a year by Team Penske in the IndyCar Series, Austin Cindric has had to face the situation from a personal and professional point of view.
'Racing can be a cruel industry,' Cindric said Saturday matter-of-factly. 'It (also) can be an incredibly rewarding industry.'
This week showed how tough it can be. Penske's IndyCar teams were found at Indianapolis to have violated a rule that barred any type of modification to a safety item with the car. While the change was not deemed to provide any advantage, it came a little more than a year after a high-profile violation regarding the push-to-pass system with the Penske cars.
With Penske ownership of the series, Indianapolis Motor Speedway and teams that compete in the IndyCar Series, the infractions raised concerns among competitors about fairness. Penske responded with the dismissals.
Dustin Long,
Among those let go was Austin's father, Tim, who had been with the organization since 1999.
While the move was jarring, Austin Cindric has had to put that event behind him.
'Professionally, I'm in no different place than I was a week ago,' he said.
His focus is on Sunday's Coca-Cola 600 (6:27 p.m. ET green flag on Prime). He starts 14th. Logano starts 16th. Blaney starts 21st.
Logano and Cindric each has a win in the last three Cup races. Cindric won at Talladega. Logano won at Texas earlier this month.
'I feel like we have a lot of momentum on our team right now on the 2 car,' said Cindric, a Daytona 500 winner. 'I've never felt better. I've never had a better start to a season. For me, I'm just more focused on execution.'
Earlier this week, Penske traveled to the team's shop in Mooresville, North Carolina, to meet with the organization's drivers and crew chiefs and also with the rest of the employees.
'Roger's our leader,' Ryan Blaney said Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway. 'We follow him no matter where he goes. I'm going to have Roger's back every single time no matter the situation. I talk to him every single week.
'When something like that happens and he wants to fly down to Charlotte and have a meeting with everybody, just to give us an understanding of his mindset and what they're going to do moving forward and where their positioning is, that's just kind of the leader you want. Someone who is in it with you, is a very open book as far as how he is feeling. As someone who works for him and drives for him, I expect nothing less because that's just the type of person that Roger is and always has been.'
With such a dramatic personnel change, it would be easy for some to wonder how that could filter into NASCAR program and impact what Cindric, Blaney, Joey Logano do.
'I'm not concerned that there could be any side effects to it as far as our team goes,' Blaney said.
Logano said the organization has to put this episode behind it.
'At this point, it's unfortunate, but we've got to move forward,' he said. 'It's something that happened and we've got to stay out the windshield as Roger always says.'
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