Richard Petty says Danica cannot win unless everyone stays home (2nd Update)
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| Pretty Danica Patrick laughing all the way to the bank |
During NASCAR media day at Daytona Thursday, Danica Patrick brushed aside Richard Petty’s comments about her inability to win a race unless everyone else stays home because she is a marketing machine raking in big dollars so she could care less.
"Everybody is entitled to their own opinion," she said. "I still believe that. That’s what makes sports and journalism great is that everybody has their own opinion. The things that I focus on is when a young kid runs up to you and wants to hug you or the ones that are so shy that don’t know what to say or the ones who say they want to grow up and be like you. I feed off that."
"I'm giving it my all every single time I get in the car.''
Petty did say in the interview that Patrick has been good for the sport from a PR perspective.
"If she’d have been a male, nobody would ever know if she’d showed up at a racetrack," Petty said, according to Wheels.ca. “This is a female deal that’s driving her. There’s nothing wrong with that, because that’s good PR for NASCAR. More fans come out, people are more interested in it. She has helped to draw attention to the sport, which helps everybody in the sport," but it still does not make her a good race car driver.
This isn’t the first time a member of the Petty family has been critical of Patrick. Last year, Kyle Petty called Patrick a “marketing machine" and “not a racecar driver.’’ He made those comments on “NASCAR Race Hub" and on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
"That’s where I have a problem," Petty said on the TV show, now seen on Fox Sports 1. "Where fans have bought into the hype of the marketing, to think she’s a race car driver. She can go fast, and I’ve seen her go fast. She drives the wheels off it when she goes fast. But she’s not a racecar driver. There's a difference. ‘The King’ (Richard Petty) always had that stupid saying, but it’s true, ‘Lots of drivers can drive fast, but very few drivers can race.’ Danica has been the perfect example of somebody who can go fast but not race.'
As for the criticism, Patrick said in June: “I really don’t care. It’s true that there are plenty of people who say bad things about me. I read them. At the end of the day, you get over that stuff and trust that you are doing a good job." She's laughing all the way to the bank.
02/11/14 A reader writes, Dear AR1.com, The NASCAR T&S computers are going to have to put Danica on pole at Daytona again this year to prove Richard Petty wrong and save the image of their star. Better yet, they'll give her an extra special restrictor plate that gives the car 100 extra HP and she'll win the race. They have to make sure she remains a hero. Mordichai Rosen, Los Angeles, CA
02/10/14 The only way Danica Patrick will win a NASCAR Sprint Cup race is if she’s the only driver on the track, says the legendary “King" of stock car racing, Richard Petty.
Petty, who visited Toronto Sunday for an appearance at the Canadian Motorsports Expo, answered quickly and decisively when asked if the former IndyCar star who’s now a second-year driver for Stewart-Haas Racing would ever visit Victory Lane in the Cup series.
“(Only) if everybody else stayed home," said Petty, who started his NASCAR career in 1958 in a race at the long-gone Canadian National Exhibition Speedway in downtown Toronto.