Josef Newgarden enters the 2026 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season coming off his lowest points finish since joining Team Penske in 2017.
Newgarden, 35, finished 12th in the 2025 championship, his poorest result since placing 13th with Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing in 2014. That final ranking last season was aided by a late surge. He entered the season finale at Nashville Superspeedway 16th in points but vaulted four positions with a victory in the 2025 finale.
The season stood in stark contrast to the early years of Newgarden’s Penske tenure, when he recorded five top-two championship finishes in his first seven seasons with the team, highlighted by titles in 2017 and 2019.
Still, Newgarden was far from alone in his struggles last year.
Team Penske endured one of the most challenging seasons in its modern history. The organization earned just two wins in 2025 — its fewest since 2007 — and suffered 15 DNFs (did not finishes) among its three drivers, the most since 1998.
Will Power’s victory on Aug. 10 at Portland International Raceway marked Penske’s latest first win of a season since the team went winless in 1999. Power led the organization in the final standings at ninth, followed by Scott McLaughlin in 10th and Newgarden in 12th.
Last season also brought significant organizational change. Following internal turmoil including the May release of Tim Cindric, Ron Ruzewski and Kyle Moyer after Indianapolis 500 rules infractions, Jonathan Diuguid was named president and Travis Law assumed the role of competition director in July.
Newgarden (photo, above) and McLaughlin admitted it took until August for things to begin clicking in wake of the new structure.
The results reflected that shift.
Team Penske won two of the final three races, and Newgarden enters 2026 with added continuity. Luke Mason remains his race engineer, while Diuguid serves as strategist. Cindric was brought back to the organization and hired as McLaughlin’s strategist.
Newgarden also enters the new season with a renewed edge, even leaning into a darker persona. A recent FOX Sports commercial casts him as a villain who “rips the hearts out” of his competitors.
“There’s a Lex Luthor,” Newgarden said. “We are the Evil Empire about to strike. Just wait. We’re coming full attack.”
Despite the renewed outlook, Newgarden said the team’s mindset remains familiar.
“It feels like business as usual in a lot of respects,” he said. “I’m excited. It’s that time of year where the cadence is starting to pick up.”
He does expect subtle but meaningful adjustments.
“I think the way we debrief, probably communication flow,” Newgarden said. “A lot of mundane things, a lot of process-driven things, will be different. Almost refreshed, if you will. It’ll be a new workflow. That’s probably the best way to put it: a slightly different cadence on race weekend. Hopefully, it will be a good, positive change.”
The driver lineup also looks different. David Malukas replaces Power, who departed after a Penske tenure that began in 2009 and included two championships (2014, 2022), 43 of his 45 career wins — among them the 2018 Indianapolis 500 – and 65 of his series-record 71 NTT P1 Awards. Malukas enters 2026 with 61 career starts.
McLaughlin remains after joining Penske in 2021 and has made 84 career starts. Newgarden, with 232 career starts, becomes the current lineup’s longest-tenured driver.
“I am the old guy,” Newgarden said. “I can’t believe I’ve been doing this for 15 years. I’ve always had a strong sense of what I’ve wanted, and that part isn’t going to change. When I was young and now that I’m older, I’ll still have the same projection in my voice about what I think we need to be doing. That part will be similar.”