Tim Cindric among 3 fired by Penske in wake of cheating scandal - ESPN

INDIANAPOLIS — Roger Penske fired team president Tim Cindric, IndyCar managing director Ron Ruzewski and IndyCar general manager Kyle Moyer on Wednesday in the wake of an Indianapolis 500 cheating scandal.

«Nothing is more important than the integrity of our sport and our race teams,» Penske said in a statement. «We have had organizational failures during the last two years, and we had to make necessary changes. I apologize to our fans, our partners and our organization for letting them down.»

Penske is owner of the three-car team, IndyCar, Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the Indy 500. He has won the Indy 500 a record 20 times.

Two-time defending Indianapolis 500 winner Josef Newgarden and teammate Will Power were found to have an illegally modified part on their cars ahead of Sunday's final round of qualifications for the 109th running of the Indianapolis 500.

Neither was allowed to qualify and both on Monday were dropped to the back of the field and will start 32nd and 33rd. Rival teams have been arguing it is not enough since it's the second cheating scandal in two seasons and illegal cars potentially bumped Jacob Abel of Dale Coyne Racing from the field.

Cindric and Ruzewski had already been suspended by IndyCar for the race and both teams fined $100,000. It is the second consecutive year they were suspended from «The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.»

The trouble for Team Penske began before the fast 12 shootout on Sunday, when rival team owner Chip Ganassi was among a chorus of competitors who accused the team of cheating. They noticed unapproved changes had been made to the rear attenuator, a safety device designed to absorb and reduce the force of impacts, and the assumption was the modifications would have given the