The horde around Danica Patrick followed her from outside her car to her hauler. Photographers, cameramen, some reporters and security walked with Patrick. A whole other group waited outside her hauler. She finished sixth in her stock-car racing debut.
“That’s a bigger crowd than we’ve had around Dale in a while,” said Kelley Earnhardt, Dale Jr.’s sister and part owner of JR Motorsports who has spent a lot of time in contact with Patrick the last few months.
The consensus from the JR Motorsports camp was that Patrick ran great. Tony Eury Jr., her crew chief and another part-owner of the team, said he’d like to see her race in next weekend’s Nationwide race.
Some quotes:
Danica Patrick on her mentality at the end of the race: “I was 5th and I was like I feel pretty good and I thought I’m not going to win sitting right here. I thought I might as well go up high and see what we can do. I was really looking at those last 10 laps as just like, whatever. Let’s see what we can do here and have fun with it. Me and Ricky [Carmichael] were having a little bit of side bumping at the end. He was really cool. I had a lot of fun with him out there.”
(Did you enjoy mixing it up?)
“I did enjoy mixing it up. It was fun. Everybody was pretty good about it. I kind of felt like I was getting bumped when I was up there at 6th and I was like loose in the kink and loose into 1 and 2 and then i got up high. I don’t know if I got hit and I don’t really care because I learned something from it.”
(What was the race like?)
“It kind of just felt like a bunch of people out there giving it a whirl. Everybody was just up high, down low. The end of the race got pretty fun.
(What happened on the spin?)
The spin was ar esult of me not coming off the yellow line. … I just held my line … I got really sideways and I slid down the track and it went straight down the grass and I thought grass is not good for grip. And I came back on the track sideways and I took my hands off the wheel and Tony Jr. was screaming for me to get back into it and I hit the gas and it caught and the wheel was so far to the right it was out of control. Once I got it straight I was right.
“I made some mistakes and I also learned a lot. I’m not thinking about next weekend.
Tony Eury Jr.:
On whether or not she’ll run the Nationwide race: “I told her I’ll support you 110% either way you go. We’re ready. … I would like to see her do it but I told her it’s 100% her call.
(How did she do?)
“Great. I mean, I couldn’t ask for too much more. She was put in some predicaments. Her and the spotter worked good together. I was pretty impressed right there in them last 20 laps. I’ll be honest with you. I was like all right she’s getting it done. The biggest goal tonight was to finish. The last 20 laps she really impressed me.
(Was she calm?)
“Yeah, I mean she’s been calm the whole time. i think that little accident she was still calm it was just a matter of us getting her slowed down so we didn’t explode any tires and blow the fenders off and make the situation worse.
“She went through a lot tonight. We put 4 tires on, we stopped for fuel, we spun out, went to the rear, come back up through it. You name it, we’ve done it. It was a good night.”
(Did you find yourself having to explain a lot on the radio?)
“I think we talked constantly because there’s a lot of things a lot of people take for granted on where she comes from and how they do things. Everything’s a lot of opposites. We’ve had this discussion the last couple weeks. She said just feed me all the information you can do. Tell me all the things, act like I’ve never done it before becacuse I haven’t. Sometimes you might hear it on the radio and think man, that’s kind of child’s play, why is he telling her that? But it’s just refreshers. Second gear is the restart, hit your marks, stuff that you’re not thinking about all the time.”
Kelley Earnhardt: “I couldn’t be happier with today. I think she showed us she was able to drive. One time I saw her up on the high side, she pulled down low. I kept thinking, ‘Come on, let’s up pull off an Earnhardt, pass 18 cars in three laps and win this thing.”
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