From IRL’s most marketable driver needs attitude adjustment (FOXSports.com, 5/26/08):
“Danica Patrick entered the Indianapolis 500 with confidence in her abilities and her Andretti Green Racing crew.
“But once the checkered flag waved…she looked ready to pick a fight — no matter whether it was another driver or a member of her own team.
“…Ryan Briscoe ran into her on pit road with 29 laps remaining. With her car’s rear suspension mangled beyond repair, the 5-foot-2 racer got out of the car and went straight for Briscoe’s Team Penske pit stall.
“If not for security crews directing her away from her destination, she may have tried to go through every one of them to get to their Australian driver.
“‘It is probably best that I didn’t get down there anyway, isn’t it?,’ she said after the race…
“After running into Briscoe…Her anger boiled over. Patrick may or may not be right in her beliefs about her race-ending accident, but with her attention-grabbing march toward the Penske pits, she gave her critics more ammunition to back their assertions that she is nothing more than an over-hyped, under-talented driver that turns petulant when things don’t go her way.”
This isn’t the first time Danica has done something like this–there was a similar incident last year.
In Defense of Danica
Robert, a reader, says Danica is getting a bad rap. He writes:
“Tony Stewart has been penalized so many times for such actions that it’s got to be coming soon to Saturday Night Live. How about AJ Foyt Jr. (not AJ IV), he was probably one of the original ‘Bad Boys,’ or Dale Earnhadt Sr…
“If I were Danica, and had some bone-head drives across multiple lanes like some idiot in 5:00 traffic, I’d be fuming too, especially if I had been fighting an ill-handling car for 3 hours prior to that, and managed only to hold ground (then again this year was a duel of maintaining momentum, no real dominant cars, so to win you had to minimize errors).
“There comes a time in the sport where you have to at the very least put on the public face that you will fight (figuratively) for your position on the track, otherwise you will soon enough get run over (literally) by every other competitor, less so in open wheel, but nonetheless true.”
Spoiled Brat or Getting a Bad Rap?
As for Estrada’s view that Danica Patrick is a spoiled brat, well, I’ve never liked that stereotype about professional athletes. It is certainly true that professional athletes are privileged in many ways, but they’ve also had to make great sacrifices and often face many hazards.
The “spoiled brat” slur usually is thrown at athletes who speak out against management, demand more pay, criticize alleged racism, or support their sport’s union. Often the players are correct. (This was particularly true during the 1981 baseball players’ strike–a righteous sports strike if there ever was one.) The “spoiled brat” view is usually espoused by people who have no concept of how hard professional athletes have to work, and how many hurdles they have to overcome.
I’m not sure if Patrick is that talented–I know little about pro racing–but she certainly has had to work hard and face many hazards. On the other hand, if there were ever any athlete who would be a spoiled brat, she might qualify–young and privileged by success, fame, and beauty. I’m sure she’s a perfectly decent person, but perhaps a mentor figure in her organization needs to give her a bit of a come-to-Jesus speech about these outbursts.
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