Steinbrenner Racing Owner George Michael Steinbrenner IV is taking a "modest approach to team management" in IndyCar's developmental Indy Lights series, but some believe the 21-year-old is the man who will one "day topple IndyCar’s titans," according to Jim Ayello of the INDIANAPOLIS STAR. They believe Steinbrenner, the grandson of late Yankees Owner George Steinbrenner, will "challenge Roger Penske, Chip Ganassi and all the rest for Indianapolis 500 wins and IndyCar championships." With his "flowing mane of dark hair and measured remarks," Steinbrenner "hardly elicits memories of his late, bombastic grandfather -- who famously outlawed long hair on his baseball team." Steinbrenner is "poised and confident, yet soft-spoken." In his first year as an Indy Lights team owner, Steinbrenner and first-year driver Colton Herta have "already left their mark." Within the next year or two, Steinbrenner, a "self-professed die-hard racing fan, hopes to graduate his Andretti-Steinbrenner program to IndyCar." Many around the paddock are "excited about the possibilities of what someone with the Steinbrenner name can do for IndyCar as it heads into an uncertain fiscal future." But many are even more "excited and impressed by the way Steinbrenner has chosen to enter the American open-wheel racing world." Former IndyCar driver and NBCSN analyst Townsend Bell said, "I look at someone like that, maybe not next year, but in the next few years, to step up and into the top level of the sport and go meet Ganassi and Penske with authority, with resources, with a winning tradition" (INDIANAPOLIS STAR, 8/27).
