Donald Trump presents Presidential Medal of Freedom to Roger Penske
Roger Penske got his Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Donald Trump on Thursday.
Trump said in June that he would be presenting the award to Penske. Those comments came after Penske had been to the White House twice already in 2019 for ceremonies. Joey Logano and Team Penske were there in May to celebrate Logano’s 2018 Cup Series title and Simon Pagenaud and his Team Penske team were honored after Pagenaud won the Indianapolis 500.
During the ceremony, Trump lauded Penske’s success as a businessman and a team owner. Penske is the winningest owner in Indianapolis 500 history. Pagenaud’s win was the 18th for the team. Penske’s also won two NASCAR Cup Series titles. Brad Keselowski won the first for the team in 2012. Keselowski also got Team Penske’s 500th win in September of 2018 when he won at Las Vegas.
“It’s amazing, many years ago my mother and father invested in me and told me the love and the passion of our great country,” Penske said. “And to think that I’m standing here today in the Oval Office with the President and the Vice President and all of you here today and especially my family to receive this wonderful award is just hard to believe that would happen.”
Penske won the 2019 IndyCar Series title when Josef Newgarden got his second championship. The team has two chances at the 2019 Cup Series championship with Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano still alive in the third round of the playoffs with four races to go.
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Nick Bromberg is a writer for Yahoo Sports
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