INDIANAPOLIS – After three decades of competing at the Indianapolis 500 Kyle Moyer finally got to see something he never saw before -- the inside of Team Penske’s garage in Gasoline Alley at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

It’s the most famous row of garages in Gasoline Alley – the inside of Row A at the Southwest End of Gasoline Alley. It’s where Team Penske has been preparing Indy 500 winning cars since the new garages in Gasoline Alley were built in 1986.

For nearly 30 years, Moyer has been working for teams at the Indianapolis 500, including a long run with Andretti Autosport dating all the way back to the days when it was Forsythe/Green Racing in the 1990s and prior to that Galles Racing and Bettenhausen Racing. At Andretti Autosport Moyer was team manager for four- and five-car efforts in the Indianapolis 500. When Team Penske added Simon Pagenaud in the offseason to increase to four cars along with 2000 Indianapolis 500 winner Juan Pablo Montoya, three-time Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves and defending Verizon IndyCar Series champion Will Power, Moyer was hired as team manager because of his experience on larger teams.

So during Sunday’s Opening Day for the 99th Indianapolis 500, Moyer looked down the long row of immaculately prepared Chevrolet IndyCars in a beautifully color-coordinated garage area with Team Penske’s signature Red, Black and White colors. Since returning to the Indy 500 in 2002 with Team Green – the forerunner of Andretti Autosport – the multi-car operation had paint schemes of various designs and colors.

But at Team Penske everything plays off the same color scheme in the team’s garage area.

“The whole trick is to get Roger Penske win No. 16 in the Indianapolis 500,” said Moyer, who began his career at the Indy 500 in 1981, but missed several years because of the CART/IRL split in the late 1990s.  “He wants No. 16 and I want to help deliver that. I look at Indianapolis as a different race than anything we run and it’s something special and Roger Penske looks at the it the same way, which I really, really like.”

Moyer oversaw an impressive Team Penske effort in Sunday’s Opening Day at Indy as the superspeedway Aero Kits were used for the first time by the 28 cars that turned laps on a very busy day of testing.

“The big difference is you are going for something different,” Moyer said. “You are going for every bit of downforce you are looking for on the road courses and at Indy you are looking for outright speed. That is the cool thing about IndyCars – you have to be completely different one week than we were last week at Barber. We were looking for downforce and cornering speed. Here we are looking for flat-out speed.

“That is what makes these drivers what they are.”

Moyer believes there is a lot of “holding back” in the garage area from the full potential of what the superspeedway setup will be at the Indy 500. That will come out during qualification weekend on May 16-17.

“I think everybody holds something back,” Moyer said. “I think the motor guys are holding something back, the aero guys are holding something back and the teams hold back. Here, it was a test day. Yes, we are having fun today and getting some tows.

“When it all comes down to it we’re still worrying about a couple Sundays from now – not today.”

Moyer said the four drivers at Team Penske were working on a checklist of items before all that information is collected and processed for later in the month.

“Some are doing aero tests, some are doing mechanical and some are rechecking things we’ve done over the winter and checking what we did last year to see if it is good this year,” Moyer explained. “It’s a combination of a little bit of everything for each driver’s responsibility. It will get different when we get closer to qualifying. Right now, it’s about each driver contributing to the team and that is the whole secret to four cars.”

Moyer and Clive Howell are team managers at Team Penske and Moyer handles the race strategy for Pagenaud. Although the driver from France has been fast, Moyer admits he doesn’t like the results up to this point.

“A lot of people say Simon has had a great year – I think he’s been disappointing up to this point,” Moyer said. “We’ve been fast a lot of places but we don’t have a pole and we don’t have a winning trophy. There are a lot of things that are out of control but a lot of things that were in our control. It’s disappointing.

“He’s fourth place on the team right now and he doesn’t want to be fourth – he wants to be first.”

Moyer is part of something special at this year’s Indianapolis 500 because victory in the “World’s Greatest Race” is expected at Team Penske.

“Listening to Rick Mears instruct on the radio here when he talks, you listen,” Moyer said. “Rick Mears in the king here and Helio Castroneves is the reigning king. He is the only one that can go for four wins.

“When you have both of those in the same door at Indianapolis you have to get it right.”