Last May 25, Sunday, the 92nd Indianapolis 500 was held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Standing at the top podium, which was the goal of all the thirty- three qualified racers, was the Brisbane-born Kiwi Scott Nixon. Second was Victor Miera with only 1.75 seconds winning margin from Nixon.
Danica Patrick who was the first woman to win an IndyCar race failed to finish the laps because of Ryan Briscoe. The suspension of Danica’s car was wrecked when Ryan pulled out of his pit box and slipped the back of Danica. Danica was infuriated with what happened. She goes out, marched firmly down the lane, then tugged off her gloves and looked as if she was ready for a second collision with Ryan but this time face to face.
The possible confrontation was prevented by the speedway official who persuaded Danica to go climbed over the pit wall and back to the garage. Then, she reappeared when she turned cooled off already.
Danica, who drives for Andretti Green Racing Team, said that one should wait if people are still pulling out in their pit boxes before blending in. Based from what happened, Danica believed the meaning was obvious. All of them work hard and one must not just come out of pit box and swing three lanes. That is why there are ‘get up to speed’ lane and ‘at speed lane’ and she is ‘at speed’.
From that point, Danica was moving stealthily forward but it was pretty obvious that Danica’s car did not have enough speed to combat with concluding winner and pole sitter Scott Dixon and other front runners. In the 200-lap contest, she had run as high as sixth but unfortunately could not advance anymore. That’s the time she let her team know her annoyance. She told herself to be slow.
In contrary to how Danica viewed herself, the owner of Danica’s car, Michael Andretti of Andretti Green Racing believed that Ryan Briscoe must be the one to blame. For him, Danica was doing well until Ryan tried to swing over and got the back end and fastened Danica at the rear.
Indeed, how Danica reacted gave her negative impression- as an ill-tempered perhaps. Well, Danica like any other human being is not perfect. She can make moves which may be unreasonable for others but for her are just right. We should not judge Danica solely for how she reacted but on her entire personality as a racer and as Danica.
08 AMpThu, 29 May 2008 03:04:14 +0000 2008 at 4:30
Danica would not have won the race, but she had a good shot at finishing in the top five. Briscoe made a dumb mistake and took her out, and she finished 22nd. That cost her valuable points in the championship race, and rather than possibly gaining a spot to 4th, she fell to 6th. That, and not having a chance to finish the race was what made her mad, not losing the race. For what it’s worth, Briscoe has only finished 45% of the IndyCar races he has started, and in 5 races this year, has had only one where his car was not damaged due to collision, and has finished only in two.