DJR Team Penske manager Jeff Swartwout will begin preparations for next year’s V8 Supercars Championship with a visit to the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000.
Swartwout, who is not scheduled to start in the role until 2015, will fly to the event from his native United States alongside Team Penske president Tim Cindric.
Loyal Penske lieutenant Swartwout has spent recent years working on the powerhouse’s NASCAR Nationwide Series program, having previously headed up its factory Porsche RS Spyder LMP2 effort.
His pre-Penske resume includes stints working at the now long defunct Truesports CART team, as well as experience at chassis manufacturers Reynard and Lola.
Swartwout, whose wife hails from New Zealand, will eventually step into the DJR Team Penske team manager position currently held by Richard Swan, who will remain with the squad in a re-profiled role.
According to Cindric, Swartwout will be the key integration point between the V8 Supercars effort and Penske’s US operations.
The trip to Bathurst will allow Cindric and Swartwout to observe DJR’s race crew in action and assess whether any more staff recruitment needs to take place ahead of 2015.
Cindric, however, says that wholesale changes are unlikely, stressing that he was impressed by the squad when he interviewed each staff member at its workshop in June.
“This isn’t a matter of Penske taking over the DJR organisation as far as personnel,” explained Cindric upon announcing the joint venture with DJR.
“We need to integrate, and that integration really is simply going to be in the form of the team manager.
“Jeff will work closely with Ryan (Story, an existing DJR manager and equity partner who will be managing director of DJR Team Penske) in terms of managing the organisation as we get started.”
Bathurst will be one of two V8 Supercars visits for Cindric in the second half of the year, as he is also confirmed to attend the season finale at Sydney Olympic Park alongside Marcos Ambrose.
The Bathurst 1000 will meanwhile mark the first event in DJR uniform for Penske’s other major appointment to the team’s existing line-up, technical director Nick Hughes.
Hughes has been employed by Penske since August, attending the last three V8 Supercars events with the team, in addition to spending time at its workshop.
Originally from Adelaide, Hughes worked with DJR when the team ran Penske dampers in the 1990s, before moving to the US, initially with Penske and then fellow NASCAR squads Evernham Motorsports and Michael Waltrip Racing
His time at MWR saw a previous connection with Ambrose, who drove for customer squad JTG Daugherty during the 2008 and 2009 Sprint Cup seasons.
While Hughes has spent recent times in Australia working for PWR and has made an early start to his DJR Penske appointment, Ambrose himself will remain in the United States until the NASCAR season finishes in November.
The DJR Team Penske entity will officially come into affect next year, with 51 percent of the ownership taken by Penske and the remaining 49 percent shared between Johnson, Story and Steve Brabeck.
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