HOMESTEAD, Fla. – In an emotional announcement Friday afternoon at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway, Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series driver Danica Patrick announced that 2017 would be her last full-time season as a race car driver.
“I don’t think I was necessarily pushed into this,” Patrick said. “I should be doing this. I feel like this is where my life should be headed. “Sometimes we just get nudged there. I was definitely faced with situations at the beginning of the year I have never faced before.
“I never had sponsor issues. It made me think about things. I am excited about the next phase, trust me.”
However, the Roscoe, Ill. native says she will compete in the 2018 Daytona 500 and make a return to the Verizon IndyCar Series and run the prestigious Indianapolis 500 in May.
She made her Cup Series debut for SHR with an affiliation with Tommy Baldwin Racing in the 2012 Daytona 500 but was collected in an early race accident and finished 38th.
Although she has not won in either event, she has had success in both. She won the pole for the 2013 Daytona 500, led five laps and contended for a top-five finish but faded to eighth on the last lap.
In 2009, she finished in third in the Indianapolis 500, making her the only woman to ever score a podium in the race.
The 35-year-old driver is also the only female driver to lead laps in the Daytona 500 and Indianapolis 500.
Patrick said she has been working on “The Danica Double” over the past few weeks with her management group. Teams for both events have not been announced or finalized. Patrick said if the opportunity presented itself to run for the same team in the same events, she would consider it.
“We’re down the line with different facets of moving forward, but nothing’s final yet,” Patrick said. “Hopefully, it will be soon, but things are definitely not set.”
Earlier this summer, she announced through Facebook she would not return to Stewart-Haas Racing partly because of sponsorship issues. Aric Almirola recently was announced as her replacement
“As I said, if it’s not going to get better, I don’t want to do it because it is not fun. Here I am, it is not fun,” she said. “My urgency to push to keep doing everything was not really there.
“If something that wasn’t really enticing didn’t come up, I wasn’t going to push for something else.”
In 189 Cup Series starts, Patrick has earned seven top-10 finishes and one pole. Her career-best finish came at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway in 2014 when she finished sixth. She has led 64 laps during a career that has spanned five full-time seasons.
But Patrick grew frustrated with her inability to find the speed necessary to compete with the top drivers of the sport.
“It’s super competitive,” Patrick added. “It’s twice the field of IndyCars, 40 instead of 20, basically. The cars make a big difference. I feel like there’s a lot out of your control as a driver, and that’s frustrating. I tried every approach I could to figure out how to make the car go fast.
“Do I push people? Do I let them do their job? Do I question them? Do I ask for other things? I tried every approach, and, really, all that ended up happening was I lost my crew chief the first time around with Tony Gibson. I didn’t end up wanting that to happen. So I was like ‘Well, shoot, nothing really worked.’ So here I am.”
In addition to Cup, she has also made 61 starts in the XFINITY Series, with one top-five and seven top-10 finishes overall. She also won one pole in the second-tier national series. Her career-best finish came at Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway where she finished fourth after starting 22nd.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
