Ashley Newgarden releases children's book
The number two is an important one to Josef Newgarden. He drives the No. 2 Team Penske Chevy, has won two IndyCar Series championships, and became a two-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 last year. And with the release of his wife Ashley Newgarden's first book 'Goodnight Racetrack', the Newgarden family has two published authors.
Like her husband’s Josef’s BIG Dream: An Indy 500 Story, Newgarden chose to write a book for children and hopes Goodnight Racetrack, written with Red Racer Books founder Andy Amendola, will serve a younger audience at bed time.
“It's been really fun to just explore this creative side,” Newgarden told RACER. “Sometimes with your husband's career, you can be in the back seat a little bit, so Josef's really been the person that's pushed me to get back into that side. And it's very therapeutic, to be honest. Once you start having kids, everything goes on the back burner, especially for a mom. So it's been really fun. I worked with him on Josef's BIG Dream, and we had a lot of fun. Andy Amendola is such a sweet guy who’s super talented, so working with him and seeing how he creates a book and that process was really fun.”
Newgarden’s book, featuring illustrations by Riley Girmann, was inspired by nightly reading to her son Kota.
“Then we started talking about the missed opportunities in racing books for children,” she said. “Josef's BIG Dream is really marketed towards five to seven year olds with a complex story, and Goodnight Racetrack goes younger as one of the rhythmic books that you can read to your child at night and you can share with them your love for racing.
“The inspiration truly was from Goodnight Moon. My son's favorite book is Goodnight Moon, and I can't even tell you how many times I've read that book. It's just on rotation constantly. When it ends, it's like, ‘One more time, one more time.’ And there's a ‘Goodnight’ book for everything, but there wasn’t one for a race track. And that actually shocked me. So we’re solving that and taking kids around the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.”
Marshall Pruett
The 2026 season marks Marshall Pruett's 40th year working in the sport. In his role today for RACER, Pruett covers open-wheel and sports car racing as a writer, reporter, photographer, and filmmaker. In his previous career, he served as a mechanic, engineer, and team manager in a variety of series, including IndyCar, IMSA, and World Challenge.
Read Marshall Pruett's articles
Latest News
Comments
Comments are disabled until you accept Social Networking Cookies. Update cookie preferences
If the dialog doesn't appear, ad-blockers are often the cause; try disabling yours or see our Social Features Support.