DAYTONA BEACH, Fla - IndyCar star Danica Patrick will make her NASCAR Nationwide Series debut Saturday at Daytona International Speedway.
Late Sunday night a team official, who wasn’t authorized to speak on the record, confirmed media reports that Patrick would make the announcement Monday, indicating they were ‘accurate’.
That official announcement came early Monday morning. The team said Patrick, Earnhardt, and team officials convened Sunday following the ARCA event at Daytona. They added that the decision for Patrick to compete in the Daytona Nationwide Series event is supported by sponsor GoDaddy.com and JRM co-owners Dale Earnhardt Jr., Tony Eury Jr., and Rick Hendrick.
"To be the one driving that Go Daddy car at Daytona means a lot to me," Patrick said. "Racing in the Nationwide Series race was my goal during this entire two-month preparation process, but we wanted to make sure it was the right thing to do. The ARCA race was a blast, and I'm not ready for my first Daytona Speedweeks to end just yet. I want more racing."
Patrick will team with Dale Earnhardt Jr., who will drive the No. 88 Chevrolet., Patrick will in the No. 7. Although Patrick will still make a qualifying attempt, she is guaranteed starting positions in all three races based off JRM's acquisition of points from CJM Racing's No. 11 team, which finished 15th in the 2009 Nationwide Series owners point standings.
"I think Danica proved to everyone that she can compete in stock cars at a high level, and right now seat time is extremely important," JR Motorsports co-owner Kelley Earnhardt said. "She has worked extremely hard during the past two months for this opportunity. Her dedication and work ethic is infectious.”
Patrick made her much heralded stock car debut this past Saturday in an ARCA Series race at Daytona International Speedway and according to the official was pleased enough with the outing that she will race once more at the famous speedway this coming weekend. The decision to enter the Nationwide race at Daytona, a week prior to her earlier announced debut at California, ‘has been hers and hers alone’.
Her crew chief at JR Motorsports, Tony Eury Jr., who led her efforts last Saturday said after the ARCA event the team will be ready and that its just a ‘matter of if we get a phone call that says ‘yes.’’
Saturday Patrick, one of a record six women who were in the ARCA lineup, ran in the lead pack for the first half of the race until getting loose in the middle of turns 1 and 2 on lap 50, losing the draft and dropping from sixth to 13th. She was later involved in an incident on the frontstretch but was able to keep her car off the wall.
Three laps later Nelson Piquet, Jr., the former Formula One driver who also used Saturday's ARCA race to make his stock car debut, made contact with Patrick's car coming off of turn 4, forcing her through the infield grass. Patrick slid sideways on the track and went through the infield grass but was able to avoid making contact. She made two pit stops following the spin, remaining on the lead lap
With 10 laps to go, Patrick started picking her way back through the lead pack and while banging fenders stole a sixth-place finish from Supercross legend Ricky Carmichael at the line.
"I was just kind of hanging out there for most of the race," said Patrick facing a media swarm after the race. "There were lots of yellows. It feels to me like I got bumped a little bit in turns one and two (on lap 53). I just held to the yellow line because I know that you're not supposed to go below the yellow line to advance your position and I took myself out unfortunately. I was pretty excited to go from last to the top five.”
Patrick seemed very happy after her first stock car event and impressed many with her performance.
“I felt pretty good, I was going side-by-side with people,” she said. “And then at the end I was running eighth and I thought what the heck so I pulled out of the line and ran high. You can see I was racing by all of the marks on the car. The GoDaddy.com Chevrolet doesn't look very pretty."
The NASCAR Nationwide Series opener at Daytona is titled the DRIVE4COPD 300 that was recently announced as the official health initiative of NASCAR. DRIVE4COPD is a multi-year public health initiative to alert millions of Americans who may be at risk for Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)
Patrick recently joined several other high profile celebrities including Emmy-nominated actor Jim Belushi, Olympic Gold Medalist Bruce Jenner, Grammy Award-winning country music star Patty Loveless, and former NFL star Michael Strahan as an official spokesperson.
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