Indianapolis, IN
‘I look better, too’: Josef Newgarden reflects on back-to-back Indy 500 wins
Two-time winner Josef Newgarden talks about his experience in Indy 500
Josef Newgarden’s image on the BorgWarner Trophy was unveiled on Wednesday, Dec. 4, 2024, at the CoHatch Polk Stables in Indianapolis.
INDIANAPOLIS — 366 days as a defending Indianapolis 500 winner – the chaotic, sometimes demanding schedule, the raucous celebrations, the hunger to win again and unique stresses that April and May 2024 delivered – aged Josef Newgarden in ways the Team Penske driver perhaps only realized Wednesday evening, nearly 200 days later.
Those wrinkles, along with the evidence of a more low-key celebratory romp through downtown Indianapolis’ night life, will now live in sterling silver on the Borg-Warner Trophy.
Because like only five of the 800 drivers to have raced in the 500 in its 113-year history, Newgarden went back-to-back in the Greatest Spectacle in Racing this May. The 110-pound Borg-Warner Trophy now carries 111 different faces and stands more than five feet tall. But like only Wilbur Shaw (1939, 1940), Mauri Rose (1947, 1948), Bill Vukovich (1953, 1954), Al Unser Sr. (1970, 1971) and Helio Castroneves (2001, 2002), Newgarden’s successes are now displayed side-by-side on the Borg, offering an opportunity for comparisons between the emotions of those two historic days, the lessons learned and the gargantuan challenge that still lies ahead.
“Oh wow, there are more wrinkles!” Newgarden exclaimed as the black sheet was removed from the base of the trophy near the end of Wednesday evening’s intimate ceremony at COHatch Polk Stables near downtown Indianapolis. “But I like the hair a little better. You don’t always get the same thing. You kinda just guess, and man, it does look better in 2024.
“I love that the details are different. You can tell I was a little different on the day. I’d had a different night. When you win it the first time, things go a little differently.”
Even to the naked eye and the casual observer, those faint details are clear in an up-close glance at the work of renowned sculptor Will Behrends, who’s crafted each face on the Trophy since 1990. On Newgarden’s Ken Doll-like figure, the faint wrinkles around his eyes pop as the light catches the sterling silver mold, just as it reveals notably taller, coiffed hair.
To the latter, Newgarden notes this May he “had a better morning, which means I had a better night.”
“I was a little more ‘professional’ the second time around, shall we say,” he continues. “The first time around, it’s a lot. You go with the flow, and then you realize that you have to wake up at 7 a.m. the next morning, and I said I wouldn’t do that again, so I was more prepared for the aftermath the second time around, and I think that reflects that.
“I definitely look slightly older, but I think I look better, too.”
It’s no doubt Newgarden appears more relaxed, more comfortable in his own skin this second time around. A year ago, the IndyCar veteran was eliminating distractions and extraneous social and business ventures – including his still young media company and his popular YouTube series with teammate Scott McLaughlin – in an effort to direct his attention, talent, time and energy to the things that mattered most to him. As he got a glimpse of his face on the Borg-Warner Trophy for the first time last year, he masked an inner turmoil from the frustrations of an otherwise disappointing 2023 IndyCar campaign.
For a dozen years, Newgarden had chased this dream. Then, just as he’d detached himself from winning the 500, the accomplishment came in a flash. For a driver famous for never being satisfied, the path forward as the newest member of the 500 winners’ fraternity was muddied.
Twelve months later, with another Baby Borg in his trophy case and winner’s ring, there’s a jovialness to the soon-to-be 34-year-old. Wednesday night, he cracked jokes – about his transition to being a veteran driver and being unafraid to admit his confidence in what would be an historic three-peat in the 500 next May.
“I think the (victory tour) the second time around is certainly more enjoyable than the first, if you can believe it,” Newgarden told IndyStar on Wednesday. “You know how to go through it and savor it a little more than just drinking through a firehose.
“The second win is different in a lot of ways. The first one, you’ve never won it, and I was in a palace where I was kinda okay with the fact that I may never win it. And then you break through, and there’s that emotion. This time around, it’s more contentment.”
To kick off Wednesday’s ceremony, the two-time series champ joked with IMS president Doug Boles about off-handed conversations they’ve had about the unique, historic way the Racing Capital of the World might celebrate the first driver to win the 500 in three straight years.
“It’s kinda crazy to think that it hasn’t been done before. It’s a unique position for us, with this race being over 100 years old,” Newgarden said. “The (odds are) certainly against us but … I don’t think we’re going to be shy about how we have a great opportunity to win it. We’ll do the same things we always do, and it would be really significant if we can get it done.”
Newgarden has begun petitioning BorgWarner executives to make a special prize if he were to do the unthinkable. Since 1995, the namesake of racing’s most famous trophy has offered a rolling jackpot to the defending 500 winner, if they were to repeat. Before this year, only Castroneves had claimed the prize, which started at $20,000 in its first year and added an additional $20,000 each year until the Brazilian took home $160,000 in 2002.
The prize pool then reset in 2003, just as it has for Newgarden for next year, meaning that after taking home a nearly half-million-dollar bonus this year ($440,000) to create a record-setting grand-prize of $4.288 million, a theoretical third-straight win in 2025 to capture perhaps American open-wheel racing’s most famous untouched feat would deliver a relatively meager $20,000 bonus.
“I don’t want to sound unappreciative of the $20,000, but can we make a three-peat challenge?” Newgarden joked on-stage Wednesday evening with BorgWarner’s global director of marketing and PR, Michelle Collins. “(BorgWarner CEO Frederic Lissalde) loves a good deal. We can insure it! Insurance companies love this kind of stuff.”
Later, Newgarden was a tad more introspective.
“I joke about it, having that extra prize money for winning three years in a row, but winning three years in a row in itself, no amount of prize money can buy the significance of that,” Newgarden told IndyStar. “It will just be significant for all of us if we can get it done.”
INDIANAPOLIS — One person is in critical condition following a shooting on Indy’s near east side.
According to the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, around 8:10 p.m., officers were called to the 2000 block of East Washington Street on reports of a person shot.
Upon arrival, police located a 50-year-old man with injuries consistent with a gunshot wound.
He is currently reported to be in extremely critical condition.
No additional information has been made available at the time of this article’s publication.
This is a developing story; check back for updates.
The Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission on June 17 gave AES the nod to raise electricity rates enough to earn an additional $71 million each year, a decision that drew reproof from Indiana lawmakers who called it another blow to cost-burdened consumers.
The approved rate represents less than half of the $192 million increase that AES initially requested. It’s also less than the $91 million increase proposed in an October settlement agreement between AES, the city of Indianapolis and major electricity consumers like Kroger and Walmart.
But the new rate is still significantly more than what the Indiana Office of Utility Consumer Counselor, the state agency representing ratepayers in the case, recommended in September. The OUCC’s proposal would have capped AES’s annual operating revenue at $21 million less than the current level.
The rate increase authorizes AES to earn a total of nearly $2 billion each year, or an estimated $384 million in profit.
The higher base rate comes as a double whammy for Indianapolis-area households, who are already paying more for electricity this summer after AES temporarily raised rates to account for higher-than-anticipated fuel costs during last winter’s storms. The increase also arrives against the backdrop of inflation, which rose to a three-year high last month, and surging gas prices due to the war in Iran.
Gov. Mike Braun wrote in a Wednesday post to X that he was “deeply disappointed” by the IURC’s approval of the rate increase.
“Hoosiers have spent years tightening their belts and making tough financial decisions,” Braun wrote. “It’s time for utility companies to do the same.”
The IURC’s decision also drew fire from the other side of the aisle. In a June 17 news release, five Democrats representing Indianapolis in the state Senate – J.D. Ford, Andrea Hunley, La Keisha Jackson, Fady Qaddoura, and Greg Taylor – chastised Indiana’s Republican supermajority for failing to rein in rising utility costs.
“Hoosiers pay more. Monopoly utilities collect more. And the leaders in the super-majority who promise affordability over and over again show those are just empty words,” the news release said. “Instead, they continue to defend a system that takes more and more out of our paychecks.”
The consumer advocacy group Citizens Action Coalition also slammed the rate increase. Ben Inskeep, CAC’s program director, said the decision left him “less optimistic that this commission is willing to do things differently and to actually hold utilities accountable.”
He said the IURC should have penalized AES for issues that plagued customers after the utility updated its billing system in 2023, including duplicated withdrawals for the same monthly bill.
The rate increase will take effect in two phases, with rates going up in July 2026 and January 2027. AES officials anticipate the hikes “will be less than $5 per month per phase” for a household that uses 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per month, according to a Wednesday news release from the utility.
“The IURC’s decision reflects a thorough, transparent process and balances the need for continued investment in the electric system with a focus on customer affordability,” the news release stated.
Under a state law that Braun signed in February, AES cannot ask for another increase to its base rate until January 2030 — though electricity bills could still go up for other reasons, like the fuel adjustment charge hitting consumers this month.
Three members of the five-member IURC signed off on the rate increase: Andy Zay, David Veleta, and David Ziegner. Commissioner Bob Deig dissented. Commissioner Anthony Swinger recused himself from the decision because he worked on the AES rate case for the OUCC before he was appointed to the IURC by Braun in January.
“None of this was taken lightly,” Zay, the IURC’s chair, said at the Wednesday hearing, adding that the commission and its staff had carefully weighed concerns about affordability. The commissioners did not go into further detail at the hearing.
But the commission’s order shows some of the debates that played out during the rate case. One point of contention was AES’s authorized return on equity — that is, how much the utility can earn each year in profits. Other disputes hinged on how AES forecasts its operating expenses.
The OUCC accused AES of including more than 100 “phantom hires,” vacant positions it did not necessarily intend to fill in its calculations. Last year, AES said that the rising costs of vegetation management, or trimming trees around power lines, also drove the need to raise rates. The OUCC recommended keeping vegetation management costs flat.
One factor that’s not driving higher prices? Data centers.
AES does not currently provide service to any data centers and did not include them in its calculations, AES president Brandi Davis-Handy said in testimony before the IURC.
Tilly Robinson is a Pulliam fellow for the Indianapolis Star. She can be reached at tilly.robinson@indystar.com.
Interactive radar | Weather alerts by county
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(WRTV) — A tornado watch has been issued through 1 a.m. EDT Thursday for much of Indiana, the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center said.
The watch area covers 47 of Indiana’s 92 counties, and includes Indianapolis and its surrounding counties.
Counties in the watch area are Bartholomew, Blackford, Boone, Brown, Carroll, Cass, Clay, Clinton, Daviess, Decatur, Delaware, Fountain, Grant, Greene, Hamilton, Hancock, Hendricks, Henry, Howard, Huntington, Jackson, Jay, Jennings, Johnson, Knox, Lawrence, Madison, Marion, Martin, Miami, Monroe, Montgomery, Morgan, Owen, Parke, Putnam, Randolph, Rush, Shelby, Sullivan, Tippecanoe, Tipton, Vermillion, Vigo, Wabash, Warren, and White.
WRTV Meteorologist Ryan Morse says Wednesday afternoon’s rain was the first of two rounds coming to the Hoosier state. A line of supercells were expected to form in Illinois and travel into central Indiana.
In neighboring Illinois, dozens of counties are under a tornado watch until 10 p.m. CDT/11 p.m. EST.
All threats of severe weather were on the table: damaging wind, strong tornadoes, large hail, and flooding.
Severe storms should exit Indiana in the early morning hours.
WISH-TV Meteorologist Keith Gibson says people should have multiple ways of getting alerts and have electronic devices fully charged in case they lose power.
The next chance for rain after these storms could be on Saturday.
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