IndyCar: Shock failure identified as cause of Newgarden crash

When Josef Newgarden suddenly crashed out of the lead late in Sunday’s race from Iowa Speedway, blame was immediately placed on a mechanical failure.

Team Penske president Tim Cindric spoke to RACER on Tuesday to explain what their investigations revealed.

“I think it’s all pretty matter of fact from where I sit – the failure was the right-rear shock,” Cindric said. “That side of the car didn’t even hit the wall.

“Half of me wishes it was something that you could say, ‘Well, that’ll never happen again, because a bolt was loose, or this happened or that happened.’ Or maybe it was an old part that broke.

“But I’m of a mixed mind here because there’s nothing that you would say we should have done different.

“And it isn’t a trick part; we’ve run the same design for a long time.  That design hasn’t changed with the part that failed.  And the part was well within the mileage limitations of what we set.

“So we sent it off to an expert to tell us what happened, and we’ve got metallurgists to look at it.  There was no crack that propagated from some other accident.  So, the reason it failed is unknown.  It’s still a mystery.”