Here’s your very quick update on Danica Patrick as the NASCAR circus roles into Darlington, South Carolina this weekend……….The “Track Too Tough to Tame” will be Danica Patrick’s second and most difficult NASCAR test to date. This infamous short track with exceptionally narrow turns will translate into a lot of bumping, paint swapping, wall banging, and driver-pit crew teamwork. Patrick will run in tonight’s Nationwide Series 200-mile race and in Saturday night’s main event…….the Bojangles’ Southern 500 with the big boys.
It’s been three months since her first Sprint Cup race at Daytona where she finished 38th, and the 1.36-mile Darlington vintage oval designed in the 1940s will be a monumental step toward achieving top-level status as she moves into a FULL Sprint Cup schedule for the Stewart-Haas team next year. Danica Patrick will be only the 3rd woman ever to run at Darlington (Janet Guthrie-1977 and Shawna Robinson-2002), and we’re all looking for her to strut her stuff on the track and not just during pre-race interviews!
Running a full-time Nationwide Series this season, she’s currently ranked 11th in driver standings…..with her best finish being 8th at Texas. The remainder of her Sprint racing schedule this year will include:
- Charlotte (May 19 & 27),
- Dover (June 3),
- Bristol (Aug. 25),
- Atlanta (Sept. 2),
- Chicagoland (Sept. 16),
- Texas (Nov. 4), and
- Phoenix (Nov. 11)
So, mark your calendars NOW! By the way, just in case you were wondering, Dave Reutimann is driving the #10 GoDaddy.com Chevy for Stewart-Haas in all the other Sprint Cup races this season.
As we know, Danica Patrick is always motivated for attention, but this weekend she will have some formidable competition off the track too. SI covergirl Brooklyn Decker will be the Darlington Grand Marshall, so she’ll have to really focus on her moves BEHIND the wheel to draw fan gawking away from Decker. Stay tuned early next week when I’ll recap Danica’s critical Darlington weekend……
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Not a bad night for “The Lady in Green”. Started 15th, finished 12th and moved up one position to No. 10 in Nationwide Series driver points. She starts at 38th (out of 47) for tonight’s Bojangles’ Southern 500…….on FOX, 7pm.
“I think I held my own”, said Danica after Saturday night’s Southern 500. She finished 31st, six laps behind winner Jimmie Johnson. Looks like Brooklyn Decker grabbed most of the off-track attention. All-in-all, a very ho-hum weekend for the GoDaddy.com girl!
Slow but steady improvement for Danica at Charlotte. She started 3rd and finished 13th in History 300 Nationwide series race, but finished 30th in Coca-Cola 600 (5 laps behind winner Kasey Kahne). Her boss, Tony Stewart, didn’t do much better than Danica finishing 25th!