racing

Team Penske today announced that Detroit-based Quicken Loans Inc., the nation’s largest online mortgage lender and third-largest mortgage lender in the country, will join the team’s IZOD IndyCar Series racing efforts as a sponsor beginning in 2013.

As part of the new multi-year agreement, Quicken Loans will be featured on the cockpit of both the No. 3 Team Penske Chevrolet IndyCar driven by three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves and the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet machine driven by three-time series road course champion Will Power. This marks the return of Quicken Loans as a sponsor of Team Penske. During the 2003 season Quicken Loans was a sponsor of the team that saw Gil de Ferran earn the 13th of Team Penske’s record 15 Indianapolis 500 victories.

“We are very excited to have Quicken Loans back as a partner of Team Penske,” said Penske Racing President Tim Cindric. “Quicken Loans’ remarkable record of success and growth makes it a great company to be affiliated with and we look forward to building our relationship in the future.”

Quicken Loans has also been announced as the presenting sponsor of the IndyCar doubleheader race weekend at the Chevrolet Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix. The Chevrolet Indy Dual in Detroit presented by Quicken Loans will feature the first IZOD IndyCar Series races held on back-to-back days next season – June 1-2, 2013 at Detroit’s redesigned Raceway at Belle Isle Park street circuit.

“As a Detroit-based company, we are looking forward to partnering with Roger Penske, who has a tremendous legacy in our hometown, as well as his amazing race team,” said Jay Farner, President and Chief Marketing Officer for Quicken Loans. “Through this sponsorship we are aligning ourselves with great drivers and great people, and in the case of the Belle Isle Grand Prix, doing great things for the city of Detroit.”

About Quicken Loans Inc.
Detroit-based Quicken Loans Inc. is the nation’s largest online home lender and the country’s third largest retail home mortgage lender. The company closed a record $70 billion of volume across all 50 states in 2012. Quicken Loans generates loan production from web centers located in Detroit, Cleveland and Scottsdale, Arizona. The company also operates a centralized loan processing facility in Detroit, as well as its San Diego-based One Reverse Mortgage unit. Quicken Loans ranked #1 in customer satisfaction among all home mortgage lenders in the United States by J.D. Power and Associates in 2010, 2011 and 2012.

Quicken Loans has ranked among the top-30 companies on FORTUNE Magazine’s annual “100 Best Companies to Work For” list for 10 consecutive years. It ranked in the top-15 of Computerworld magazine’s “100 Best Places to Work In Technology” for eight years in a row, ranking in the top-5 in 2012. The company recently moved its headquarters and more than 7,000 of its 8,000-plus team members to downtown Detroit. For more information about Quicken Loans, please visit quickenloans.com, on Twitter at @QLnews, and on Facebook at facebook.com/QuickenLoans.

About Penske Racing
Penske Racing is one of the most successful teams in the history of professional sports. Competing in a variety of disciplines, cars owned and prepared by Penske Racing have produced 365 major race wins, 423 pole positions and 24 National Championships, including the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series title. The team has also earned a record 15 Indianapolis 500 victories in its storied history. For more information about Penske Racing, please visit www.penskeracing.com.

[Source: PenskeRacing.com]

After earning his first NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship in the Penske Racing Dodge, Brad Keselowski was touring the Charlotte Motor Speedway 1.5 mile oval behind the wheel of the 2013 Ford Fusion.

Roger Penske made the switch at the end of the 2012 season. The champion was in the No. 2 Miller Lite Fusion this morning. “It’s hard to get a great read on the whole manufacturer change because, obviously, it’s a different car, but I think all the signs are there that we have the potential to be just as strong, if not stronger, than we were last year, which is very, very encouraging,” said Keselowski during the break.

The choice to attend the NASCAR two-day open test was up to the teams. Penske took advantage of the opportunity for both Keselowski and new driver Joey Logano. It is not only their first opportunity to run the Ford brand, but mainly testing the 2013 “Gen 6” version Fusion.

Keselowski added before the afternoon session, “It’s been a lot of fun having the first day today working with Joey, which I think has been probably more of an adjusting process than the actual car itself, and a good adjusting process. I’m curious to see over time how we can work together and push each other to be the best we can be, so I’ve had a lot of fun with that so far. We’ve got a lot of work to do. We’re only a half-a-day into two really important days, not only for Penske Racing but for the sport itself and, hopefully, we can continue to show progress.”

(Source: Motorspot.com)

How about this. After the insane Juan Pablo Montoya crash from tonight’s Daytona 500, driver Brad Keselowski sent out a tweet from inside his car, showing his many followers what he saw as the track went up in flames.

Who ever would have thought that today, we would be able to see a track-side view of the Montoya flames, courtesy of a driver? If you’re not following @Keselowski, this is what you’re missing:

The picture in question was of the fiery crash involving Juan Pablo Montoya and a jet drier truck in Turn 3 at Daytona International Speedway. After officials red-flagged the race to clean up the mess, Keselowski tweeted several more photos and began interacting with racing fans on his Twitter account.

Before the crash, the 28-year-old had a little more than 87,000 Twitter followers, but he gained thousands of new followers during the break in action.

“Nobody else has a phone,” Keselowski said when interviewed from pit row. “They should get one to see what is going on.”

“They keep making fun of it, but I’m having a good time. It’s great to talk to the fans.”

Keselowski has been of the leading voices on the social media front for the auto racing series. His NASCAR Camping World Truck Series No. 19 truck featured Twitter handles from 2,600 fans that were selected through a contest on his blog.

After the restart, Keselowski was involved in a multi-car crash on Lap 187 and within a minute of the wreck he tweeted, “Nothing we could do there … Never saw the wreck till we were windshield deep. #daytona500.”

“(I got) a lot (of followers), but I’d take the win first,” Keselowski told FOX television following his release from the care center.

When asked about Keselowski’s tweeting during the red-flag break, Dale Earnhardt Jr. said he wasn’t interested in tweeting.

“That’s just how Brad is,” Dale Earnhardt Jr. said. “We did take the phone and put it to use and checked the weather.”

Of course driving safely is very important so please, do not tweet and drive.

 

Note: Fortunately Brad Keselowski didn’t pull out his phone until his car had stopped. During the Daytona 500’s red flag which came as a result of Juan Pablo Montoya running into a jet dryer that subsequently burst into towering flames, Keselowski began chatting up fans on his Twitter page.

Of the many new team combinations that will be followed with interest this Sprint Cup season, one of the most interesting dynamics exists at Penske Racing.

Brad Keselowski suddenly is the “veteran” team statesman, and the new kid on the block is AJ Allmendinger, fresh from Richard Petty Motorsports and ready to take advantage of a huge opportunity.

The Dinger was one of the biggest gainers in the off-season shuffle of drivers, crew chiefs and other team personnel, and his goal at Penske this season will be to win races and duplicate the overall Penske effort last year, which put Keselowski and then-teammate Kurt Busch in the Chase.

“This is a challenge that I welcome and look forward to,” Allmendinger said. “The two Penske teams were strong enough to both win races and make the Chase last year, and we’re looking for that same level of success this season. It’ll be important to start off the season on a positive note.

“Testing proved to each of us that, even though we haven’t had much time together, we all have the same goal and are really excited to get going. Testing also showed, though, that the drafting and NASCAR making changes to try and put forth the best racing possible, makes the Daytona 500 just about anybody’s game. I think we’ve got one of the best shots out there, and definitely a team capable of winning at any of the 36 races.”

Penske scored five wins last season, Keselowski winning three times despite a major foot injury and Busch winning twice. Keselowski finished fifth in points, and Busch was 11th.

Allmendinger was 15th in points for RPM.

Allmendinger will be shooting for his first career victory this season. He finished 24th in points in 2009 and 19th in 2010.

“I think it is a very realistic goal to win races and make the Chase this season,” he said. “I think Penske Racing proved last season that working with Dodge as only a two-car effort isn’t necessarily a bad situation. They proved that a smaller group with a strong common goal and clear way of doing things can be just as strong, maybe stronger.

“This is my second time around working with Dodge, and I’ve seen how dedicated they are to our sport. We’re really looking forward to taking them to victory lane this season.”

Allmendinger perhaps will be under more scrutiny than other driver this year.

“We have spent most of our time in NASCAR just trying to survive,” he said. “Getting this opportunity to drive the Shell-Pennzoil Dodge for Penske Racing is truly like a double blessing. I am finally getting the stability I have needed to do my best, but I am also realizing a dream in driving for Mr. Penske.

“Coming from my open-wheel background, Roger Penske and his organization and race teams are just the best of the best. I am committed to representing Penske Racing, Shell-Pennzoil, Dodge and all the other great partners the best I can on and off the track.”

Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEED.com and has been covering motorsports for 30 years. He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.

Source:SpeedTV.com

On Thursday, January 26 President of GM North America Mark Reuss, and Chairman of Crain Communications Keith Crain, will take the stage at the 2012 Washington Auto Show to present Roger Penske with the Keith Crain Automotive News Lifetime Achievement Award.

Automotive News reports, “The award is given annually to an individual who has made a significant contribution to the auto industry.” One look at Roger Penske’s accomplishments and it is clear to see that his contributions to the automotive industry have been nothing short of just that… significant.

Roger Penske’s passion for cars and the automotive industry started at a young age. The son of a car dealer, Penske spent his teenage years as a “lot boy” for a dealership while he honed his ability to build lasting and meaningful relationships with anyone he came into contact with. This quality is reflected in the words of his colleagues. Keith Crain had this to say about the Automotive News Lifetime Achievement Award recipient: “For his ingenuity as an entrepreneur and his passion for speed and the art of design, Roger Penske is a visionary in the automotive industry.”

The Penske Corporation oversees operations at more than 1,800 locations employing more than 36,000 people worldwide. The Penske Truck Leasing company, which provides customers with everything from complete fleet management to residential moving trucks, is comprised of over 1000 locations worldwide. The Penske retail automotive business has grown to over 325 franchises including the largest Toyota dealership in the United States. However, Roger Penske’s accomplishments are not confined to the automotive sales and leasing industry, Penske is also the recipient of the Sports Illustrated SCCA Driver of the Year Award.

The Penske Racing Team captured their first Championship Car victory in the Pocono 500 on July 3, 1971. Since then, they have stacked up 340 major race victories, over 400 pole positions and 23 National Championships. In addition to those staggering numbers, the Penske Racing Team has dominated the Indianapolis 500 by taking home 15 checkered flags over the last 4 years. The closest competitor has achieved this feat only 5 times in the history of the race.

The Washington Auto Show is the largest public show in the capital. Held at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Northwest D.C., the event will feature more than 700 new makes and models from over 42 manufacturers. The Keith Crain Lifetime Achievement Award will be presented upon commencement of the 2012 Washington Auto Show on January 26 and it will be followed by a dinner reception at 7:00PM. For more information about how you can be a part of this celebratory award ceremony visit the Washington Auto Show website at http://www.washingtonautoshow.com

Information in this article courtesy of http://www.washingtonautoshow.com/

Picture Courtesy of http://www.trucktrend.com/

Can AJ Allmendinger make the grade as the new driver of Penske Racing’s No. 22 Shell-Pennzoil Dodge in 2012?

If tenacity, desire and will–together with great talent–have anything to do with it, the Penske Racing team has a new winner to replace departed Kurt Busch, the 2004 NASCAR Sprint Cup champion and 24-race winner.

The 30-year-old driver from Los Gatos, CA–currently residing in the Mooresville, NC area with wife Lynne–has had grand successes in auto racing but in NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series, the grand stage of stock car racing, he’s had a difficult time, never having the stability that’s essential to succeeding.

Allmendinger, named for A.J. Foyt Jr by his race-loving parents, first showed his innate skills in karting. I remember watching him at the Stars of Karting event at Bryan Herta’s track outside Las Vegas in late 2000, where he was a member of Paul Tracy’s team. Allmendinger did not win that event, but he did secure two IKF karting titles that helped propel him to the Barber Dodge Pro Series.

The Dinger won the Barber Dodge championship in his rookie 2002 season, putting a wheel wrong only once, in the Road America race. I recall watching the poor Barber Dodge mechanics digging dirt from inside his stricken race car and labeling it “Mount Allmendinger,” with flag affixed and all.

Allmendinger went to New Zealand as a Team USA Scholarship winner in 2002 and scored one pole and four top-four results flying the Team USA colors. From there he conquered the 2003 Toyota Atlantic championship, at that time the longest-lived ladder championship on American shores, winning Rookie of the Year honors simultaneously as he drove for Carl Russo’s RuSport Racing.

Both the team and Allmendinger graduated to the Champ Car World Series in 2004, and the driver again took Rookie of the Year honors, thanks to a run of six top-six results as the season came to its close; he beat out Briton Justin Wilson for the award. Wilson became Allmendinger’s teammate in 2005 but in June of 2006, RuSport replaced the Californian with Cristiano da Matta, the 2002 CART champion recently returned from Formula 1.

Forsythe Championship Racing quickly picked up The Dinger and he rewarded them with three consecutive race wins and a total of five overall in the 2006 season. And then Team Red Bull, for whom Allmendinger should have been driving in F1–instead of Scott Speed–came calling with a lucrative offer to go to Cup.

Allmendinger started his NASCAR career late in 2006 in the Craftsman Truck Series, where he drove for Bill Davis Racing, making three starts and earning a best finish of fifth–in his second race at Talladega Superspeedway.

He drove the No. 84 Sprint Cup Red Bull Toyota entry, beginning full-time in 2007, but it was a learning experience for both team and driver. He did much of the “Car of Tomorrow” grunt work as the season progressed and ran some select Truck races for Toyota as he learned the big differences between open wheel and NASCAR trucks and race cars.

Eventually, Allmendinger got canned from the Red Bull squad in favor of Speed–who was released a couple of years later after his own sub-par results. The two-time former open wheel champion eventually landed at Richard Petty Motorsports after it merged with Gillett Evernharm Motorsports following the 2008 season.

Allmendinger’s best Cup season is the one just ended, where he finished 15th for the year, just three places from the possibility of making the Chase for the Sprint Cup NASCAR playoffs. RPM put Greg Erwin on the pit box starting with the 2011 Brickyard 400 and that pairing led to Allmendinger’s late-season surge of six top-10 results.

No doubt Allmendinger’s skills in working with his new crew chief influenced Roger Penske and Tim Cindric when it was time to choose who would succeed Busch after their six-year run together.

Cindric and Allmendinger got together before the close of the year to talk about their new liaison in Cup racing and how they got to this point, what it means and where they go from here. Not only do they have a new driver in Allmendinger, but Penske Racing needed to secure a new crew chief for the No. 22 Shell-Pennzoil Dodge and chose to promote Todd Gordon from the Nationwide ranks.

Cindric knows it’s a tough row to hoe, with so many changes occurring within the organization since the final race at Homestead-Miami Speedwy. “To go through [these changes] and have a different crew chief and a different driver going into next year, when it really wasn’t the plan starting the year,” that’s going to be tough for the team.

They’re also–as is every NASCAR Sprint Cup team–dealing with the intricacies of changing from carburetors to electronic fuel injection for fuel delivery on the Dodge engines, so they need both driver and crew chief that are used to making informed decisions on the fly.

“We certainly wanted to be sure that we made the right decision,” Cindric said, “and sometimes you need more time to try and understand what the landscape (ahead) looks like.”

With the volatility of Richard Petty Motorsports, which lost the No. 43’s Best Buy sponsorship to Roush Fenway Racing after the close of the year, Allmendinger was relieved to land at a group as stable as Penske Racing after “the things I”ve been up against basically my whole five years in the Sprint Cup Series,” Allmendinger related. “To find an organization that has stability and obviously the whole Penske organization has a ton of stability and great sponsors, walking through the shop, just the way everything is laid out and presented is absolutely amazing and something I’d never seen before,” he allowed.

Allmendinger never expected to be in this situation after the race at Homestead; he fully expected to remain with RPM in the coming season. “It wasn’t something that, for me, it was easily made,” he said of the decision to ask for his release from RPM in order to join Penske Racing. “I love the race team, my guys over at Richard Petty Motorsports, and just felt like we’ve built such good chemistry over the last four to five months of the season, to get to this point was a tough challenge.

“But at the same point, looking at an organization and where I”m going and the people that surround it, also made the decision a little bit easier because I knew that this was a great place to be,” he said of Penske Racing. “I’m still trying to get my head wrapped around it,” he said of the quick change of venues. “As tough as the decision was to make, I’m happy to be here.”

With Speed Weeks at Daytona less than a month and a half away, “I think that AJ is really going to lean on Brad (teammate Keselowski) to try and understand wht it takes to move into this organization and be successful,” Cindric pondered, “and I think Brad is committed as a teammate to help him get up to speed as soon as possible because he’s certainly shown that he’s committed to making that happen. There’s really no better place to do that than Daytona, where you’ve got to work together from the beginning.”

Cindric and Roger Penske had many choices in the merry-go-round that is the driver marketplace at the end of each season. “We had to look at potential,” Cindric

admitted. “I think that we considered virtually everybody that was out there and made sure that we did our due diligence to try and understand if there was anything in the landscape that we didn’t know or that wasn’t obvious,” he said.

“AJ was someone we had talked to over the years but he really wasn’t somebody that we considered until really almost the 11th hour. There was noise about the fact that they might not be able to make things work (at RPM). And when we sat down and looked at the guys that were available and at AJ – the on-track performance, if you look at it, there’s nobody there that has a better progression through his career. When you look at the slope of the curve there with the way his statistics are, certainly no one has that type of slope.”

And so AJ Allmendinger goes from one legend’s lair (Richard Petty) to another’s, Roger Penske. He realizes that this opportunity–much like the one he accepted in working with Forsythe Championship Racing back in 2006–offers him the chance to show just how good he can be in a Penske Dodge.

“I’m going to be smiling showing up to the racetrack every weekend,” Allmendinger said. “This is what I love to do and if I wasn’t smiling, I shouldn’t be driving race cars. It’s going to be pretty special and to have Mr Penske just around the racetrack talking to me, just being able to be around him, it’s more of an honor to drive for him. I love the history of racing in general and obviously, Mr Penske has a rich history in racing. It’s going to be just fun being at the racetrack, being a part of his organization and being around him more than anything. That’s something I really look forward to.”

NASCAR fans all around the country are asking themselves, “Who will fill the void?” As Penske Racing is searching for their replacement candidate for the 2012 season, Penske Racing and NASCAR fans are anxiously anticipating who will be added to their stable of wonderful like Brad Keselowski, who has a fantastic future with Penske Racing, as he is just beginning to hit his stride.

Are all eyes on David Ragan, the currently seat-less driver out of Roush-Fenway Racing? Ragan captured two Coors Light Pole Awards and a win at Daytona International.

Another replacement being considered for the No. 22 Dodge is David Reutimann.

Another driver looking for employment is Brian Vickers. He has made the Chase and has one additional career-win than Ragan. Add to that, he has won a championship in the NASCAR Busch Grand National Series, what is now the Nationwide Series

Penske Racing is back into forming a solid stable for the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, with a tough decision ahead of them.

Honda Performance Development (HPD) is Honda’s racing design and development company, responsible for supplying engines to the IndyCar series, American Le Mans Series and European Lea Mans series. They specialize in designing engines, parts, and chassis for racing vehicles of all types, from race cars to go-karts. The company is now also offering parts to grassroots racing programs. According to Lee Niffenegger, Senior Engineer at HPD, “anything that Honda builds, we try to race.”

Members of HPD’s Honda Racing Line program can get technical support from engineers at HPD and can buy OE parts and HPD parts developed specifically for racing. Honda Racing Line members can be entry level or professional racers.

A key component to HPD is their ethos. HPD strives for constant innovation and reflects Soichiro Honda’s belief that competition is essential for fueling innovation and improvement. According to the HPD website, “While second place can be painful, reflection on such failure can lead to the next success.” Such forward thinking can thus take a failure and turn it into a success by highlighting what went wrong and how to fix it.

Since 1993, such an ethos has helped HPD earn wins at manufacturer and driver championships. With Honda engines, many drivers have won over the years, but have seen particular success within the past ten years. In 2004, Honda’s aspirated V-8 engine was the dominant motor in the IndyCar series and helped Honda drivers win 14 out of 16 races, including the Indianapolis 500. Last year, HPD won its 100th IndyCar race when Dario Franchitti won the Indianapolis 500.

HPD was established in 1993 and has helped support the IndyCar program with their engines since. The company is based in Santa Clarita, California. HPD recently announced that in 2012, it will be supplying engines to the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing team.