Danica Patrick reveals the ‘greatest regret’ of her racing career
Danica Patrick’s greatest regret is missing out on a historic IndyCar win.
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Danica Patrick (Via IMAGO)
Former NASCAR and IndyCar driver Danica Patrick has admitted that playing it safe in the final restart of the 2005 Indy 500 is the greatest regret of her life. Patrick, the only woman to win an IndyCar race and arguably the most successful female racer of all time that day, missed the opportunity to win one of the three crown jewel races of the Motorsports world.
While discussing her missed Indy 500 opportunity, the legendary driver turned podcaster/pundit pointed out that it’s the most regretful moment of her career as it can never be replicated. She never found herself in the same position in her IndyCar career. Patrick says she could’ve gone all out for the win, hoping for a caution instead of playing it safe.
“Well, because they’re hard to come by, period. And you know, being experienced now looking back like, I would have rather hoped for a yellow at the very end and then stayed in the lead than playing it safe to make sure that I had enough fuel to finish the race,” Patrick told Graham Bensinger of NBC News 4 when asked was 2005 Indy 500 the greatest regret of her career.
Patrick found herself in the final phase battle with Dan Wheldon. She had an impressive restart but was asked by her team not to go 100% as the fuel was about to run out. This allowed Wheldon to pass her and eventually take the win. At the same time, Patrick had to fight hard even to secure a P4 finish.
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Danica Patrick explains what she could have done instead
The star driver, who holds most of the female racing records in NASCAR and IndyCar, pointed out that running out of fuel would have been a much better outcome for her than the poor P4 finish for playing it safe. She added that going for it, hoping she had enough fuel or expecting a caution, was the better decision.
“Like, much cooler to run out of fuel in the lead than it is to just drop back at the end. I mean, it was still a great story, but play the Lucky Dog card and hope for hope for some luck where you can win the race. So anyway, I would have just banked on hoping I had enough or a yellow instead of just detuning myself,” Patrick said.
She added that if she had had the experience she has right now, she would have gone for the win. Patrick said, “Of course, this is not what I knew them, which is why I didn’t include it in the decision. But we didn’t have the right systems in place to know exactly how much fuel was left. So I ended with enough for two and a half more laps. So another… That was just like the real information on how I could have, you know, made it but…”
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Justin P Joy
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