Another First For Danica! She Will Be First Woman To Announce A NASCAR Race
Danica Patrick has had a lot of firsts in her racing career. She was the first woman to win an INDYCAR race, she was the first woman to take a pole for a NASCAR race, and she has the highest finish in a Sprint Cup race for a woman. This June, Patrick enters the broadcast booth to help announce a Xfinity series race, making her the first woman to announce a NASCAR race from the booth.
Several Sprint Cup series drivers will be in the booth this season to help announce and analyze for the Xfinity series. Among them will be Patrick’s teammate and reigning Sprint Cup champion Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, and retiring driver Jeff Gordon.
NASCAR has legions of female fans, but it is definitely a male-dominated sport, as Patrick is the only woman currently racing in their top two stock car series. As Sports Illustrated reported, the GoDaddy driver will be in the broadcast booth for the June 13 race at Michigan International Speedway.
The driver will be in the announcer’s booth with regular Xfinity play-by-play announcer Alexander Adams and analyst Michael Waltrip. Harvick kicked off the racing season by being in the booth to give his thoughts on the first Xfinity race of the season at Daytona, which was won by Ryan Reed.
Along with announcing that Patrick will be in the announcer’s booth, NBC Sports reported that Danica has no interest in going into F1 racing.
One of the owners of her NASCAR team, Gene Haas of Stewart-Haas racing, is fielding a team in Formula One starting in 2016. Due to their connection and her experience in open wheel racing, there has been speculation that Haas might encourage Patrick to join his team. However, Patrick said no one has asked her about it.
“Many, many people have always said that I will move to F1 one day. But no one ever talked to me about it. That’s okay, because I wouldn’t go anyway. It’s not so much that I am not interested in driving a Formula One car, but in order to do it properly, I would have to leave the U.S., and for me that is out of the question.”
Patrick did race overseas early in her career when she moved to England as a teenager to race open wheel cars, and she did race in Formula Ford. However, F1 racers are groomed from a young age, and it would be tough for anyone to enter that type of racing who hasn’t done it before.
As the Inquisitr reported, Patrick is competing in the biggest race of the year for NASCAR, the Daytona 500. She starts 20 in the #10 Chevrolet.
[Image via sportsglory.com]
