When Danica Patrick broke into racing, especially in NASCAR’s heavily male-dominated landscape, she paved a path that reshaped the sport’s horizon. Her rise opened the door for female drivers such as Katherine Legge, Natalie Decker, and many others who followed in her tire tracks. Patrick quickly became a touchstone for a generation of young girls who saw their own ambitions mirrored in Patrick’s fearless approach behind the wheel.
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Her retirement in 2018, following one final run in the Daytona 500, created a natural changing of the guard. As new female drivers entered the arena, a familiar question trailed each one of them: whether they felt any pressure to fill the space Patrick left behind or match the success she had amassed. Decker addressed that question in 2019 and offered an honest view of her mindset.
“Her retiring doesn’t put any pressure on me, but I do have pressure on myself to make it there because, to make it to the Cup Series has been the biggest goal of mine since I was really, really little. So I feel pressure from myself, but from other people, or what Danica did, I don’t feel that kind of pressure from that.”
“I really do want to be up there and be one of the females racing in NASCAR. And it’s not going to just be me; there’s going to be more. There’s a lot of females now racing, a lot coming up. It’s really cool to see that and really cool to be a part of it,” she continued.
However, when discussing the hurdles she faced while climbing toward NASCAR, Decker explained that the toughest challenges didn’t come after she arrived; they came long before she entered the national spotlight.
Several male drivers her age had already grown up seeing women compete, largely because Patrick had changed the landscape. By the time Decker reached NASCAR, the environment no longer felt unfamiliar or unwelcoming to female competitors.
However, her earliest days told a different story. She started racing full-sized stock cars when she was just 12, and stepping into that world as a young girl placed her under a spotlight she didn’t fully recognize at the time.
Being young meant she didn’t grasp the weight of it, and she appreciated that innocence. Decker believes that if she had understood the barriers then, the path might have unfolded differently.
Still, in recent times, she talks about one obstacle that remains as steep as ever: securing sponsorship. Decker didn’t sugarcoat how essential and demanding that process is. She called it the hardest part of the sport, the task that absorbs most of a driver’s energy simply to keep their seat and make it to the next race.
