Rumored Penske illegal 3rd damper “Malarkey”?

UPDATE #2 AR1.com spoke to one team owner who did not want to be quoted this morning in the Barber Motorsports paddock and he explained to us that what the Penske team have done is weld the anti-rollbar in a way that causes it to act like another spring. The owner said if you remove the regular springs from the other cars the car will drop flat to the ground. Not so with the Penske's because the anti-rollbar continues to act as a spring, suspending the car. Some teams have done this in the rear of the car, but the Penske's apparently have it is front and back, the front being harder to do. These cars are a pullrod suspension, so everything in the front of the car is buried inside the footwell, and is not visible like many formula cars.

04/10/10 As it turns out, the area in question was a roll bar and IndyCar technical chief Les MacTaggart says The Captain is playing by the rules reports SPEEDTV.com.

“It’s a clever way of using bar deflection to control pitch and Roger’s team has been running it for at least two and a half years," said MacTaggart. “It’s totally within the rules and other teams have used it or tried it.

“Besides giving the teams something to play with, it also helps save tub damage, and it was approved back in the free development period, in February of 2008."

Penske said it was pretty cut and dried.

“We passed technical inspection before and after the race," said The Captain, whose driver Will Power is unbeaten (2-0) in 2010. “And we aren’t using any illegal parts or devices."

“We thought Penske was running some form of ride control in front of their car at Detroit in 2008," said Mike Hull, managing director of Target/Ganassi Racing. “Julian (Robertson, engineer) went to Les and specifically asked if we could submit a version or ride control and was told it was not in the spirit of the rules and would not be allowed.

“So we didn’t pursue it. Our opinion today is that Penske is legal. We have no problem with that. But we do have a problem that we were denied an opportunity and that Penske was the only team doing it in 2008, so that should fall under the restrictions of 2009."

04/09/10 We talked with another team owner, who has a connection with the Penske team who says that the rumors of an illegal third damper in the front suspension of the Penske cars is "absolute malarkey" and said that he thinks someone was just giving the media something to fuss about. He said Roger and his team would have far too much to lose if they were to get caught doing something as blatant as that, and that his sponsorship deals include integrity clauses that could jeopardize a sponsorship if the team does anything that reflects poorly on the image of the sponsor.