Newgarden chief mechanic Law headed to Porsche program

Travis Law, chief mechanic and crew leader on Josef Newgarden’s No.2 Team Penske Chevy, has received a major promotion and will shift into a new role of competition director within the Penske Porsche Motorsport sports car program at the end of the IndyCar season.

A new crew chief for Newgarden’s car will be named in due time.

Law got his start at Team Penske during its last engagement with Porsche in the American Le Mans Series where he served as a mechanic on the title-winning LMP2 RS Spyders. He moved to IndyCar at the conclusion of the effort, and continued working as a mechanic before being promoted to the role of crew chief in 2014 on Helio Castroneves’ IndyCar entry.

He would eventually shift to Newgarden’s car where he won championships with the Tennessean in 2017 and 2019, and as the winningest driver this season in IndyCar, Law and the No.2 crew are poised to contend for a third crown before he transitions to PPM’s factory IMSA and FIA WEC program.

“I’ve been at Team Penske a long time and you're always looking to grow yourself and become better when you’re surrounded by a ton of good people, and that’s what happened when this opportunity came up,” Law told RACER. “I knew this would be something that was pretty cool with Penske Porsche Motorsport, and we still have an IndyCar season to run with Josef and do our absolute best with the 2 car team.”

The majority of Newgarden’s success in IndyCar has come with Law at his side; winning the recent Indy 500 Pit Stop Competition was just the latest reminder of how effective the No.2 Chevy crew has been over the last five years.

It’s not uncommon for the sport’s best mechanics to be promoted into positions that leave the wrenches and wheel guns behind, but that doesn’t mean the upcoming end to Law’s time with Newgarden and the No.2 team will be an easy change to process.

“I've talked to Josef about it and he's been super supportive,” Law said. “And I can't thank him enough for how encouraging he has been with this transition. Josef’s been a great friend to me, and we still have goals to execute in the second half of the season. We're going to make sure that we do everything we can to deliver for our team and achieve those goals.”

Law will work under fellow Penske veteran Jonathan Diuguid, who serves as managing director of PPM. They won’t need much time to find their rhythm; Diuguid was the race engineer for Castroneves when Law was promoted to crew chief on the Brazilian’s car.

“I’ll have a lot to learn [as PPM’s competition director], but I'm surrounded every day by great co-workers and Jonathan is just one example of that who are grinding every day on this program,” Law added. “To be next to those guys on this program is incredible and I have to thank Roger [Penske] and [team president] Tim Cindric and everybody else for acknowledging the effort and choosing me for this new role.”