Penske Racing achieved its goal of winning the 2006 Indy Racing League IndyCar Series championship on Sunday, Sept. 10, as Sam Hornish Jr. finished a strong third in the season-ending The Peak Antifreeze Indy 300 at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill.

Winner's Circle: Roger Penske (left) Sam Hornish Jr. and Penske Performance president Tim Cindric, a 1990 Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology mechanical engineering graduate, celebrate the team's first IndyCar Series championship on Sunday. (Photo courtesy of the Indy Racing League)

The series title was the first for Penske Racing owner Roger Penske and Tim Cindric, president of Penske Performance Inc. Cindric is a 1990 Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology mechanical engineering alumnus.

Hornish Jr. tied Dan Wheldon, winner of Sunday's race, with 475 points after the competitive IRL season. The tiebreaker was the fact that Hornish had won four races, including the Indianapolis 500, during the season. Wheldon placed second while Helio Castroneves of Penske Racing finished third with 473 points.

“It’s been an unbelievable year for us," Hornish told reporters after receiving the $1 million champion’s prize from IRL president and chief operating officer Brian Barnhart. "We’ve had some ups and downs but the Indianapolis 500 victory, that’s the highlight of my career. It really catapulted us back into the points championship, the hunt.”

“Today,” Penske reminded reporters, “our pit crew was probably at their best. They worked all week and we talked about it two weeks ago. Today was problematic because we had two drivers within one point of each other. With two of our guys (Hornish and Castroneves) fighting each other, you never really know what can happen. We had two races today; one for the race, the other for the championship... It was a great day.”

On race days, Cindric helps set race strategy for Castroneves, while Penske is in constant communication with Hornish.

Cindric put the capper on Hornish’s achievement, and the team’s performance this season, stating: “For the team and what we went through this year. To leave Reading, Pa. (Penske Racing's former headquarters), [as] we started this year, this is a pretty special place for everybody that’s been there for so long. To leave there with an Indy 500 win and a championship is great. We wanted to close the doors down with a party, not a flood. At least we can leave there as champions on both accounts.”

Penske Performance Inc. is now headquartered in Mooresville, N.C. Besides the IndyCar Series, Cindric also has responsibility for Penske Performance operations in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series and American LeMans Series.

"Tim's management experience and technical expertise are ideally suited to meet the challenges ahead," Penske said.

Penske Racing is one of the most successful teams in the history of professional sports. Competing in a variety of disciplines, cars owned and prepared by Penske Racing have 19 national championships.