Roger Penske continues to set standard at Indianapolis 500 with 18th win as owner

INDIANAPOLIS — Roger Penske took a sharpie, walked toward the TV cameras and wrote #18 on the lens.

The world would know — if it didn't already — Penske had just marked his 18th Indianapolis 500 win, an unrivaled record by any team owner at the iconic Indianapolis Motor Speedway. 

Simon Pagenaud took Sunday's victory in thrilling fashion, a back-and-forth battle with Alexander Rossi in the final laps. The victory marked back-to-back wins for the team; Penske driver Will Power won the race last year. 

In 50 years, since Penske first brought a team to Indianapolis in 1969, he's won 38% of the 44 races at IMS. 

He's intense and aggressive and sets incredibly high standards for his team, said Kyle Moyer, general manager for Penske's IndyCar program, and he expects nothing less than a victory every single May.

"He's on your back, looking at you," Moyer said after Sunday's race. "Everybody is here to win. You're expected to win."

And when a win doesn't happen, you're expected to fix it, Moyer said.

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The 82-year-old "Captain" of racing, as Penske is often called, had a different take Sunday when asked for an explanation of his team's dominance at the Indianapolis 500.

"Our people," said Penske. "There were 700 years of experience in our pits this weekend. No one guy can win. This success here is amazing and you can't do it without people."

Penske got his first taste of the race when he attended the Indianapolis 500 with his dad in 1951. He became a champion sport car driver in the 1950s and 60s, before forming his own team.

Since then, he's been immersed in all types of racing, from stock to sport to open wheel and has won more than 500 races worldwide.

But the Indianapolis 500?

"This place just gets you," Penske said. "Either you win — or you go home. And you come back next year." 

'The goal was to win the race'

The last time Penske had back-to-back victories at the Indianapolis 500 was a three-year run — Helio Castroneves in 2001 and 2002 and Gil de Ferran in 2003.

But Penske was dominating long before that. It started in 1969, when Penske brought his first team to the speedway.

"The goal was to win the race," Penske said of that inaugural showing 50 years ago.

But he would have to wait three more years until 1972 for a 500 victory. Penske driver Gary Bettenhausen led most of that Indianapolis 500 until losing an engine with 24 laps to go.

As often is the case with Penske — and his power in numbers philosophy — another driver was ready to cover. Teammate Mark Donohue led the final laps to Penske's first Indianapolis 500 victory.

Penske said when he tries to remember the 1972 race, all he thinks of is Donohue. In 1975, Donohue died after lapsing into a coma from a cerebral hemorrhage due to an accident racing.  

"I'd rather get back Mark than win a race," he said.

But he would win many, many more races in Indianapolis — 1979, 1981, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1991, 1993, 1994, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2009, 2015, 2018, 2019.

"It's unbelievable," Sunday's third-place finisher Takuma Sato said after the race, "for Penske (to win again)."

His 500 love is evident

He's a business mogul, with an empire beneath him and a net worth of $1.5 billion.  And yet, that one race that started in 1911 is Penske's weak spot.

"The Indy 500 to Roger is just his love," said Al Unser, Jr., who won the race with Penske in 1994. "He just loves it so much. He puts so much effort into it, so much detail into it."

And so it was tough on Penske, who sat out of the race from 1996 to 2000 due to the open-wheel split. In 2001, the team crossed a picket-line entering rookie  Castroneves and de Ferran in the race. The two led the most laps, and gave Penske a 1-2 finish, the first time in the team's history.

After the race, Penske told reporters that "after the heartbreak in 1995, the win was the biggest of all his Indy 500 wins."

He hated not being able to race in Indianapolis.

"Roger has set the standard in IndyCar racing since he showed up in 1969," Unser Jr. said. "This is his race."