December 16, 2009
By Chuck Abrams
Danica Patrick finally made the long anticipated announcement that she will start dipping her well-manicured toes into the NASCAR pool.
Danica shares the distinction of being known by just a single name like Madonna, Beyonce, Marilyn and other powerful female performers. But Danica is blessed with more than an attractive face and a body often clothed for calendar pictures. She can drive an open wheeled race car around a track at over 200 mph.
That, and her ability to bring a sponsor with money into NASCAR, will allow her to gain her first taste of stock car racing for JR Motorsports come February 2010. She will race in the ARCA race at Daytona and, it is assumed, the Nationwide race as well.
While it is well documented how fed up I am with all the Danica Mania that has been swirling around her for the past couple of years, I am excited to see what she can do on the track. She has won one race in the IRL, won several World Karting Association championships as a youngster, finished third in the Toyota Atlantic series (where I first came across her) in 2004 and competed in Europe in the Formula Ford and Vauxhall series.
She also won the Rookie of The Year awards in the 2005 Indy 500 and IRL series. Her season finishes in the IRL have been improving steadily from 12th in 2005 to 5th in 2009.
Now she's moving to cars with fenders on them -- that drive more like dump trucks than the high tech open wheel cars she is driving in the IRL.
But Danica is no dummy. She has done her homework by speaking to a lot of folks inside NASCAR about what it takes to be successful in the sport. It is no secret that NASCAR has not been kind to women in the past. Janet Guthrie, Shawna Robinson, Patty Moise, Jennifer Jo Cobb and others have all tried to make it big in the sport. But a lack of sponsorship and average equipment have kept them from having a long career in the sport.
Danica now takes up the flag and has arguably the best pedigree of any female driver attempting to break into the boy’s club known as NASCAR and the ultimate boy’s club, Cup racing. And all those that have followed her in recent years, you know she is not shy about her ability, her ability to gain notice, or speaking her mind about another driver or other topics. She is kind of like Smoke, JPM and Kyle Busch all rolled into one.
Danica has a marketing machine built around her and she knows the value of her brand personality. I would argue that she personally has one of the best marketing senses in the IRL garage and now the NASCAR garage. She knows that she will need to compete soon and consistently to overcome the plethora of doubters in the media and the fan base. And since her announcement, I have been asked about ARCA from casual fans who have never heard of the series before. So even before she steps a foot onto the hallowed grounds of Daytona, she has already sparked interest amongst the population.
What other driver from the IRL could do that?
Racing for JR Motorsports will set her up pretty well in the ARCA and Nationwide series. JRM is affiliated with Hendrick Motorsports, so she will get the best equipment a driver can have and she will get Tony Eury, Jr. as her crew chief. So learning curve aside, she has a lot of the cards stacked in her favor.
Her NASCAR schedule has not been released yet and Danica has said that her NASCAR seat time will work around her IRL schedule, a calendar that starts March 14 and runs through October 2. That gives her a possible 9 Nationwide races to compete in and 3 ARCA races. Based on the race schedules, she will have far less time in ARCA to learn before she spends even more time in the Nationwide cars. And Nationwide will move to a COT-type car that will be significantly different than Cup cars at some point in 2009.
My 2010 wish: Hearing more about Danica’s prowess behind the wheel than her daring in front of an SI calendar photographer.
Let me know your thoughts.
Drive fast, turn left and keep the shiny side up.
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