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Danica: “…I’m better than I’ve ever been”

Danica Patrick doesn’t particularly believe in setting specific goals for the 2008 IndyCar Series season. But it’s clear that the thought of finally breaking through for her first career victory is never far from her mind.

“You know, I just want to get it done,” said the fourth-year veteran in an Indy Racing League media teleconference today.

“Is that so bad to say? I feel like there’s been times where I’ve come close. There’s been times where I’ve been maybe more preoccupied being a team player. And I think that I really feel like it’s time. It’s my time to do it. It’s overdue, and it’s going to be a big relief when it finally happens.”

Patrick will begin her second season with Andretti Green Racing next week with an Open Test at Homestead, Fla., and after a jam-packed winter, she wouldn’t be blamed for counting down the days until she can hop back into the No. 7 Motorola machine.

In addition to testing at Barber Motorsports Park and Phoenix International Raceway this off-season, she’s also made mainstream headlines with her role in a rejected Super Bowl ad for her sponsor, GoDaddy.com, and a four-page spread in this year’s Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.

But while Patrick was happy to oblige the media’s questions about running afoul of the Fox censors and posing in a bikini, she also said that she’s ready to get back to work.

And to Patrick, a championship season will require a fast start, beginning with the season-opening race on Mar. 29 at Homestead:

“…I really feel like I’m becoming some sort of an old person in racing. Like four years, this is my fourth year. So I’m going into this one instead of some of the others saying, ‘Look, if I want a shot at winning championships, everything, you’ve got to get out of the box fast.’ You have to go hard early and get some good results in. You know, don’t be too complacent.

“You know, you have to finish. Because those DNFs at the beginning of the season will come back to haunt you later. But you really need to make sure you get good finishes.”

Patrick finished seventh in the IndyCar championship standings last year, her first season with Andretti-Green Racing. While her inaugural campaign with the team didn’t net her a win, Patrick did score her best career finish with a second-place showing on the Detroit street course and also hung tough on many of the ovals with highlights of third-place runs at Texas Motor Speedway and Nashville Superspeedway.

Now, with IndyCar Series and Indy 500 champion Dario Franchitti out of AGR and off to NASCAR with Chip Ganassi, AGR has had to re-shuffle its deck slightly. Rookie pilot Hideki Mutoh will replace Franchitti in the No. 27, alongside Patrick, Marco Andretti and Tony Kanaan.

But while Mutoh’s acclimation process with the team is just beginning, Patrick felt that her own “getting-to-know-you” phase is over:

“Well, I think I’m acclimated. I think that first year plays a big part. I think [the Indianapolis 500] plays a big part because you spend so much time with them. You spend 30 days together talking for hours. It’s impossible to not learn each other and get along. But I think that all of the things that I’ve done from last year and to be honest, it’s every single year, everything you do helps you get that much further down the road and experience and what you need to succeed.”

In addition to getting used to the ways of Andretti Green, she also feels that she’s reached a point where she can truly get the most out of her car on any occasion — a state of racing nirvana, if you will:

“It’s always nice as a driver when you get to the point where you feel like it’s kind of your little toy. You just do what you want with it, and you’re in control of it. And I think that I’m, you know, to that point now where I feel good.”

The open-wheel superstar also said that she feels good about the state of the IndyCar Series as it enters a new phase of its existence.

While the series has lost champions in Franchitti and Sam Hornish Jr., the pending unification with the Champ Car World Series could jack the number of rivals up to the highest point in a decade. In their ranks lie a former Formula One driver in Justin Wilson, a rising American star in Graham Rahal and a controversial past champion in Paul Tracy.

But Patrick is ready to rise to the challenges that this season will bring, merger or not.  While she admits that her quest for that elusive first win has been frustrating at times, she also sounds like she’s savoring the chance to serve her critics a bit of crow:

“With frustrations of coming close to winning and bad luck, compartmentalizing [all of that], they’re all the same thing. In racing, you have to get lucky. You have to be good, and then, you know, if you have both of those things then you win races and you finish up front all the time.

“So for me, I feel like I have the same good and bad luck as anybody else. When it comes to being good, I think that I’m better than I’ve ever been, so I think, therefore, I have the best chances I’ve ever had to win.”

And with a unified series seemingly on the way, she may not be the only winner if she follows through on those chances.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 20th, 2008 at 5:20 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.