Cindric proposes IndyCar champion Will Power will run No. 1 in 2015 - MotorSportsTalk

Team Penske president Tim Cindric has taken the first step to indicate a number switch for newly crowned Verizon IndyCar Series champion Will Power in 2015.

Power has run the No. 12 since joining Team Penske in 2009, with his Verizon Team Penske entry full-time since 2010.

But with the title he claimed Saturday night at Auto Club Speedway, Power appears set to adopt the champion’s No. 1 for 2015, which is available to be utilized but hasn’t been taken up as often as it used to be.

A fan asked the question of car numbers on Twitter Saturday night, and Cindric responded thusly:

That’s the plan! @Team_Penske will be sporting #1 #2 #3 Hope to see @12WillPower run the #1 in 2015. @TimCindric @Team_Penske #IndyCar”

— Tim Cindric (@TimCindric) August 31, 2014

Assuming Power makes the switch, he’d join teammates Juan Pablo Montoya and Helio Castroneves in numerical order of Nos. 1, 2 and 3 in 2015.

Ryan Hunter-Reay took the champion’s No. 1 in 2013 but struggled through an up-and-down year.

Prior to that, the most recent No. 1 usage was by Sebastien Bourdais in Champ Car, from 2005 through 2007 (after titles from 2004 through 2007), and Scott Dixon in 2004 after his 2003 IndyCar title.

Dixon opted to retain the No. 9 for his Target Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet this season, as he has had the same number since 2003.

On one hand, it makes a lot of sense for Power to run the 1. It’s 15 years in the making as Power has grown in his career year-by-year, and now finally be rewarded with the champion’s number. It also would see Team Penske run the 1 for the first time since Gil de Ferran did in the 2001 CART season, after claiming the 2000 championship.

On the other, it would be a bit of a shift as Power and the 12 are about as synonymous in IndyCar as any driver-number pairing this side of Dixon in the last several years. In a series that struggles for the same visual driver/number recognizability as NASCAR drivers tend to have, Power and the 12 are well established. Verizon and Power have been linked by the 12 for all their marketing and promotional materials; show cars have the 12 as well. Power’s Twitter handle is @12WillPower, so there’s that, too.

Still, we know how smart and savvy Cindric and Team Penske are. The benefits of running the 1 for one year would likely outweigh the negatives of the alterations needed – and given the title drought for the team that’s now ended, it would be just reward for their accomplishments.

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Media and fan attention focused on a controversial run-in between Haiden Deegan and his Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing teammate Jordon Smith during Round 10 of the Monster Energy Supercross race at Detroit, after which the 250 East points’ Hunter Lawrence defends the young rider in the postrace news conference.

Deegan took the early lead in Heat 1 of the round, but the mood swiftly changed when he became embroiled in a spirited battle with teammate Smith.

On Lap 3, Smith caught Deegan with a fast pass through the whoops. Smith briefly held the lead heading into a bowl turn but Deegan had the inside line and threw a block pass. In the next few turns, the action heated up until Smith eventually ran into the back of Deegan’s Yamaha and crashed.

One of the highlights of the battle seemed to include a moment when Deegan waited on Smith in order to throw a second block pass, adding fuel to the controversy.

After his initial crash, Smith fell to seventh on the next lap. He would crash twice more during the event, ultimately finishing four laps off the pace in 20th.

The topic was inevitably part of the postrace news conference.

“It was good racing; it was fun,” Deegan said at about the 27-minute mark in the video above. “I just had some fun doing it.”

Smith had more trouble in the Last Chance Qualifier. He stalled his bike in heavy traffic, worked his way into a battle for fourth with the checkers in sight, but crashed a few yards shy of the finish line and was credited with seventh. Smith earned zero points and fell to sixth in the standings.

Lawrence defends Deegan — *Jordon Smith failed to make the Detroit Supercross Main and fell to sixth in the points. – Feld Motor Sports*

“I think he’s like fifth in points,” Deegan said. “He’s a little out of it. Beside that it was good, I don’t know. I wasn’t really paying attention.”

Deegan jokingly deflected an earlier question with the response that he wasn’t paying attention during the incident.

“He’s my teammate, but he’s a veteran, he’s been in this sport for a while,” Deegan said. “I was up there just battling. I want to win as much as everybody else. It doesn’t matter if it’s a heat race or a main; I just want to win. I was just trying to push that.”

As Deegan and Smith battled, Jeremy Martin took the lead. Deegan finished second in the heat and backed up his performance with a solid third-place showing in the main, which was his second podium finish in a short six-race career. Deegan’s first podium was earned at Daytona, just two rounds ago.

But as Deegan struggled to find something meaningful to say, unsurprisingly for a 17-year-old rider who was not scheduled to run the full 250 schedule this year, it was the championship leader Lawrence who came to his defense.

“I just want to point something out, which kind of amazes me,” Lawrence said during the conference. “So many of the people on social media, where everyone puts their expertise in, are saying the racing back in the ’80s, the early 90s, when me were men. They’re always talking about how gnarly it was and then anytime a block pass or something happens now, everyone cries about it.

“That’s just a little bit interesting. Pick one. You want the gnarly block passes from 10 years ago and then you get it, everyone makes a big song and dance about it.”

Pressed further, Lawrence defended not only the pass but the decision-making process that gets employed lap after lap in a Supercross race.

“It’s easy to point the finger,” Lawrence said. “We’re out there making decisions in a split millisecond. People have all month to pay their phone bill and they still can’t do that on time.

“We’re making decisions at such a fast reaction [time with] adrenaline. … I’m not just saying it for me or Haiden. I speak for all the guys. No one is perfect and we’re under a microscope out there. The media is really quick to point a finger when someone makes a mistake.”

The media is required to hold athletes accountable for their actions. They are also required to tell the complete story.

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