Former NASCAR driver Kenny Wallace has said that Team Penske owner Roger Penske is "embarrassed" after the cheating claims following the IndyCar race at St. Petersburg.
Team Penske faced trouble with authorities earlier this week after data from St. Petersburg showed that their drivers were using the "push-to-pass" feature on their cars, which is not allowed. This feature provides drivers with more acceleration but is not permitted to be used on race starts and restarts. To ensure that, it is turned on or off by officials.
However, the authorities discovered that Team Penske drivers had bypassed the rule and used the system when they were not supposed to. For that, Josef Newgarden's victory was taken away, and 10 points were scraped off all three drivers. Furthermore, the team was also fined $25,000.
Reacting to the same, former NASCAR driver Kenny Wallace, who claims to know Penske, said that the team owner is embarrassed. This is, as he mentioned, because of the Indy 500 race that will be held next month, and Roger Penske is also the owner of the track. He said in a video on his YouTube channel (07:59):
"I know Roger Penske, and I can tell you right now he's embarrassed. He's pissed because Roger Penske owns the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, right? However the Herminator being the promoter I am I'm thinking to myself hey guess what it's going to be in five days?
"It's going to be the month of May, baby. The Indianapolis 500, Kyle Larson's going to be there and guess what the other story is going to be 'Penske cheated at St Petersburg!"
Roger Penske's driver Will Power denies using the "P2P" at unauthorized times
The data received from the earlier IndyCar race revealed that two of the three Penske drivers - Josef Newgarden and Scott McLaughlin - had used the P2P abilities at unauthorized times.
Their third driver, Will Power, denied the use of P2P during start or restart. In a social media post, he said that he was unaware of the situation and didn't utilize the button. He wrote:
"As per the rules, I did not utilize the P2P capabilities during any start or restart during the St. Petersburg race. While I accept the penalty, I want it to be known that I did nothing wrong and followed the rules. Now we move forward and my focus is on Barber."