Motorsports

Speed reading

By BRANT JAMES
Published April 22, 2006

Indy Racing League driver Danica Patrick said her exploding popularity last season was not only a boon for her professionally, but provided her with one of the major "value tests" of her life. She had to quickly learn, she said, who she was as a person and how she wanted to be portrayed in public. Though she has done provocative pictorials for men's magazines before, she declined an offer from Playboy.

"You have to watch it, you have to make sure in photos, what direction people want to go with those and sometimes you have to really put your foot down and say what you want because at the end of the day it is your image and not something you got talked into or the way the photographer wanted it.

"You have your whole life to do risky things and right now I'm trying not to do that, but at the same time, I'm just being myself and trying to have fun. I'm not going to lie and say I don't want to look pretty or sexy in pictures or a commercial, but there is a fine line you walk, and I feel if I'm comfortable with what I've done, then I can stand tall and proud."

NO EXCUSE: DeLana Harvick, wife of Nextel Cup driver Kevin Harvick and a principal in his truck and Busch Series team, told the Gaston Gazette that the pit box spat between Greg Biffle's girlfriend, Nicole Lunders , and Kurt Busch's fiancee, Eva Bryan, at Texas Motor Speedway was inexcusable.

"There's absolutely no reason to confront another spouse," she said. "They absolutely have nothing to do with what happened on the track. Period. It's inappropriate and it's unacceptable. It's a double-edged sword. You're so emotionally attached to everything that happens. Someone's safety is at stake. However, there are people there. There are cameras. That's not acceptable."

[Last modified April 22, 2006, 01:39:14]