Chip Ganassi pays tribute to Roger Penske

In a media gathering at Indianapolis Motor Speedway today, Ganassi said: “I think first and foremost I have to thank Roger for doing what he did for racing because it really provided a runway for people like me coming into the sport.

“When I was a young kid in my early 20s, someone put me on the phone with Roger and I was asking him different questions about the sport. I often think about that when young people contact me.

“I remember what an impact it had on me as a 23- or 24-year-old at the time, talking to someone who was such an obvious luminary in the sport.”

He went on: “Obviously [I have] a lot of respect and he's still the one who sets the bar and sets the height of the bar, if you will. It's at a high level, I can tell you! It's made made opportunities for people like myself. I'll be forever grateful to him for that.”

As a former driver, Ganassi was asked how hard it had been to quit driving and instead become a team owner, Ganassi said: “In those days. in my own mind, you had to sort of make a five-year commitment, if you were going to be in this sport. I was looking at it in five-year chunks.

And I just thought that it was probably time for me to look into doing something else in the sport.

There were younger drivers coming along at the time that were getting the opportunities that I had gotten, you know, in years past. And they seemed to be taking advantage of that a little more.

“Guys like Michael [Andretti] and Al [Unser] Jr., were coming along. They were taking up spots that were there and opportunities that were normally there for someone like myself, those guys were getting those opportunities. And good for them. I was happy for them. Not so happy that I wasn't getting them myself.

“But you know, it was probably time for me to look at some other way to enjoy the sport and some other way to take up my weekends, and so ownership seemed to work out OK.”