Remember ABC’s Wide World of Sports?
WWoS was a dedicated undedicated (think about it) sports program bringing its viewers “. . . the constant variety of sport . . .” that for most of its 37 years was a weekend network TV sports staple. Started in 1961, WWoS ended – at least insofar as “regularly scheduled” is concerned – in early 1998 when late broadcaster Jim McKay, the voice and face most singularly associated with WWoS, publicly announced its demise.
Having been primarily focused on radio since being spun off from NBC in the late 1940’s, upstart television network American Broadcasting Company had achieved particular appeal among young, hip urbanites who in part were enthralled with its early 1960’s primetime hits The Flintstones and The Jetsons (both in “color,” no less); WWoS becoming a part of ABC’s cutting edge mentality.
A big part of a television-viewing, which in the U.S. at the time had all of three commercial-broadcast nationwide networks (you being far too young to remember, Lucy, there really was a time when non-existent were 1,593 cable channels from which to choose), WWoS opened millions of U.S. viewer eyes, albeit usually delayed, to previously unknown sports that ran the gamut from Middle East Arabian horseracing to a curious southern-U.S. form of motorsports known as the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing.
Now, who doesn’t remember WWoS show’s intro? You know, the one where the ski-jump guy (Vinko Bogataj in March 21, 1970) was the first to broadcast the viewing public’s peculiar fascination – as each America’s Funniest Home Videos episode attests – with males (and, possibly, at least some hermaphrodites and no, Smallwood, were not talking “Greek Goddess”) taking a hit where polls clearly and unanimously show males least prefer getting, um, nailed. (If the reader has no clue, there will be a point in life when it’ll hit, figuratively or literally – or one could just tune in AFHV).
The above is recounted because it’s pretty doggone close to what this writer must do each day.
No, not that.
In sort of a personal modern WWoS, laboriously mined each day are hundreds of Web pages for motorsports racing tidbits. And the World Wide Web usually fails to disappoint, providing a wonderful trove (no, “treasure” needn’t necessarily precede) of well known mainstream or odd niche facts that sometimes are less-than-fully accurate or, unfortunately, sometimes downright intentionally distorted information “taken out of context” and, at times without being questioned, cleanly fitting the mind of the writer, viewer or a “choir resident.”
And so it was recently when yours truly encountered a crudely written anti-Milka Duno strike in an overall larger diatribe that best could be described as uncomplimentary of the Rolex Series and, particularly, its Daytona Prototypes and, even more particularly, those drivers – all of those drivers – found therein, furthermore citing Duno’s 2004 “win” in the series as being a particularly emblematic of all Grand-Am drivers’ total worthlessness while singling another particular North American sports car series as being significantly superior.
One could spend a lot of time pointing out each Rolex Series Daytona Prototype driver’s background, driving records, lineage and/or pedigree but, choosing minimalism, let’s instead briefly examine just two who have participated in the Rolex Series – leading off with Duno, herownself.
To Be Precise, Duno Won Three Races In 2004
In what was only that season’s second race coinciding with her second-only Daytona Prototype race, Duno’s first DP win came February 28, 2004, at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Her second DP win that year, on Sept. 12, 2004, also came at HMS in what is graciously described as one of the most hellaciously hot Rolex Series races ever conducted.
(Phoenix International Raceway’s May 2006 race was pretty doggone hot, but at 115 degrees it was a “dry” hot and one which left a person no clue he was dehydrating until administered were intravenous fluids. At HMS’ Sept. 2004 race, downing water bottle after water bottle, one could watch it simultaneously pour from the consuming body as did water from an animated cartoon character’s bullet-riddled body.)
In that 2004 season, only three Rolex Series drivers exceeded Duno in Daytona Prototype wins: Scott Pruett, Max Papis and Wayne Taylor. Eventual 2004 series DP driving champs Pruett and Papis, in the No. 01 CompUSA Chip Ganassi Racing w/ Felix (and, yes, even back then; y José) Sabates Lexus-Riley, scored four wins; Taylor, in an assuredly meaner-looking black No. 10 SunTrust Pontiac-Riley, scored three wins. At the end of the 2004 Rolex Series season Duno would record her highest championship points-finish, fifth, in that series.
Oh, and Duno’s third-and-final 2004 race win? It was scored Sept. 25 in an Intersport Racing Lola B2K/40 Judd in the 675LMP class at Petit Le Mans which, according to most observers, wasn’t on the Grand-Am schedule. But, maybe those who think highly of ALMS don’t think quite as highly of a class victory within that series, the implication being “class” drivers aren’t nearly as skilled as “overall.”
In what the anti-Duno types likely also consider an “inconsequential” record – especially given the rarity with which it is cited – in 2001 Duno won four races and placed second in ALMS LMP675 points driving a Dick Barbour Reynard 01Q/Judd, besting 14 other drivers in the season-ending championship standings and among whom were Scott Maxwell (8th) and Andrew Davis (11th).
In 2007, in a career-best Rolex 24 finished second in Peter Baron’s No. 2 CITGO Pontiac-Riley, less than a lap behind winners Pruett, Salvador Duran and Juan Pablo Montoya.
Meanwhile, At Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course
More recently, Duno competed at the Aug. 8 Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course’s Honda Indy 200 and finished a relatively dismal 23rd after starting 27th but at least was in front of Jay Howard (24th), Takuma Sato (25), EJ Viso (26) and Justin Wilson (27). For the sake of prospective interest, the race’s only other female driver, Danica Patrick, finished in 21st (starting 22nd), two spots in front of Duno.
The Mid-O IRL IndyCar Series race had 15 caution laps of the 85 total recorded by Target Chip Ganassi’s Dario Franchitti, who won. In it Duno completed 81 laps at an average of 95.228 mph even though undertaking seven (count ‘em, 7) pit stops (compare to Franchitti’s three), no doubt some or all coming during the five cautions’ 15 laps. The race field’s overall average speed came in a tick over 100 mph.
In 3 ½ IndyCar Series seasons, Duno has finished no higher than 8th place.
Coincidentally, after climbing various racing-career ladders in their respective home countries, in 2000 Duno and Patrick started their “big league” racing-career phases on foreign soil – Patrick in Europe and Duno in the United States.
Which Brings Us To Driver No. 2, Danica Patrick
In an aggressive schedule that had her running five races in fewer than 30 days, Patrick’s first race in the British Racing & Sports Car Club Formula Ford Zetec race at Brand Hatch in England (April 10, 2000), in which her Andy Welch Racing Mygale SJ00/Ford failed to finish. Outside of three top fives and among her four top 10’s in 18 BRSCC Formula Ford finishes compiled over little more than a year’s time, Patrick’s run there wasn’t exactly spectacular – although she’d credit the experience with a necessary emotional toughening that would later cite as useful .
Returning to U.S. racing in 2002, Patrick scored a third-place in Long Beach’s annual Toyota celebrity race and then headed for a relatively short Barber Dodge Pro race stint that bore no podiums but started a path of recognition – such as being named the American Auto Racing Writers & Broadcasters Association’s 2002 Gorsline Scholarship recipient – that opened the door to higher-profile racing roles.
Competing in the CART (later, Champ Car World Series) Toyota Atlantic championship under the auspices of Bobby Rahal, in 2003 Patrick soon started putting together preceding racing years’ jigsaw-puzzle pieces. Resoundingly signaling her arrival by opening with a third-place finish at Monterrey, Mexico’s Parque Fundidora, over the following 2003 and 2004 Toyota Atlantic seasons Patrick would claim one pole (Portland International, 2004) and five podiums – but still lacked a race win.
Also competing in the same 2003 Monterrey, Mexico, Toyota Atlantic race, Michael Valiante, now with Mike Shank, claimed the Monterrey race among his three 2003 wins and later finished third in the 2003 Toyota Atlantic championship. Eventual 2003 Toyota Atlantic championship runner-up Ryan Dalziel, now with Peter Baron’s Starworks, finished fourth, winning two later races in a 2003 Toyota Atlantic championship that eventual Richard Petty Motorsports driver A.J. Allmendinger won. GAINSCO’s Jon Fogarty is the 2004 CCWS TA champion.
In the IndyCar Series, Patrick in 2008 posted an emotional first win at Japan’s Twin Ring Motegi but in more than 40 IRL races since has scored eight top-5s. In 2010 Patrick posted three top-10, including a second at Texas, but leaving one to wonder if her lack of another win is attributable to her forward-think (NASCAR?); Andretti’s inability to field a car worthy of the talent or Patrick’s skill set.
Now in her sixth season of IndyCar Series competition, Patrick as of Aug. 8, 2010, has claimed six podiums; three poles – all in her first season – and one win that came at Honda’s favorite race track.
Meanwhile At Michigan International Speedway
In the Aug. 14th NASCAR Nationwide Series’ Carfax 250, Danica Patrick drove JR Motorsports’ No. 7 Hot Wheels/GoDaddy.com Chevrolet to a 27th-place finish after starting 33rd. A lap down after 21 laps into the 125-lap Michigan International Speedway race, by her 40th lap Patrick was three laps down and ultimately finished four laps down to eventual race-winner Brad Keselowski’s Penske Racing No. 22 Discount Tire Dodge.
Patrick bested notables like Michael McDowell (28th), Kenny Wallace (29th), Ryan Newman (36th) and Kevin Lepage (42nd), among others. In six 2010 Nationwide races Patrick has two DNF’s and no top 10s.
In sportscar racing Patrick has competed in two Rolex 24s at Daytona: the 2009 Rolex 24 At Daytona in which Patrick finished 8th and in the 2006 version, at the end of which she finished 50th.
After the IndyCar Series’ most recent Mid-Ohio race, Patrick is 11th in the series points. At 24th in points, Duno clearly isn’t. However, she is there.
And Therein Lies The Difference
Some reading this will have seen the above as a defense of Duno or perhaps, even though stated otherwise, an “attack” on Patrick.
It is neither.
Rather, it is the recognition of three things:
1) Deriding one person’s sportscar victory cheapens the contributions made by her co-drivers:
Andy Wallace, who co-drive with Duno in her two 2004 Rolex Series win in a CITGO-sponsored Crawford (DP03 no. 01) has won more than 25 International Sports car races, among which are victories in the Rolex 24 At Daytona, 24 Heures Du Mans and Mobil 1 12-hours of Sebring. Wallace has driven and won races (nearly 30 times) in cars fielded by Tom Walkinshaw, Dan Gurney, Rob Dyson, Max Crawford and others. With Duno in that 2004 Petite Le Mans-winning Intersport car were Clint Field and “The Mad Scotsman” Robin Liddell.
2) Duno at the very least, albeit slow by some standards, is racing at speeds that eclipse whatever this writer and the vast majority of her critics have regularly done in any type of car.
“Oh, but I’ve done 95 mph a lot of times!” Yeah? Just how many times and where? On a veritable straight line called “Interstate” or a straight section of a two-lane country road? It is one thing to think one “averages” a given speed on Interstate and quite another to actually average that speed on a 2.3-mile track having 13 turns and considered one of the most technical in racing that includes off-camber pavement angles, esses and a 180-degree turn. Or go petal-to-metal on tracks like Daytona International Speedway on which every race car routinely and suddenly undertakes unplanned lane tosses nearly every lap.
(By the way, the next time you take a few-hundred-miles trip it might surprise you to learn that an average speed and occasionally hitting that speed are widely different matters. On your next trip of any length, even to work, record the total distance covered and the total elapsed time expended in covering it, including “pit stops.” Divide the former by the latter and you’ll learn your average MPH wasn’t as high as you probably believed. Yours truly learned that lesson when he once drove a new Chevy SS 396 roundtrip from Florida to Tennessee and learned his “65 mph average” really wasn’t . . . by far. If higher-level mathematics leaves you wishing you had Grand-Am timing-and-scoring genius Don Abbott in your corner, go here for three different ways to calculate time, distance and speed).
3) Duno, Patrick, Sarah Fisher and, before them, Desiré Wilson, Janet Guthrie, Lyn St. James, Patty Moise and many more, had guts, drive and sheer determination having a magnitude which many race-watchers can only dream – or lack comprehension of the required effort.
A question concerning a driver’s competency and whether he or she is allowed to compete in any given series is determined only by the sanctioning body of that series and not by fellow competitors who, at most, have three basic options: focus on first getting to checkered flag; bellyache privately or publicly; or, race somewhere else.
If nothing else, Duno brought a sponsor to the any of the series in which she has competed. That sponsor’s money not only allowed Duno to occupy a seat but created jobs: from the people who supplied the raw materials going into her racing car’s parts to the team manager sitting atop the pit box and, perhaps, photographers, writers and still others – along with accompanying overhead roofs, clothing and food in the refrigerators for the families of each.
In another vane, Duno often made possible those 18-car-minimum grids promised by the Indy Racing League to race promoters and broadcasters. Put another way: Duno helped keep the IRL alive (or, from another standpoint, helped bury the Champ Car World Series).
Usually seen as unpalatable the suggestion of abrogated free thought, expression or will – that is, a challenge of a person being disposed of and exercising self-determination in thinking, work or pleasurable activities – why is it then okay to damn another who only seeks to fulfill self-determination and is playing by the rules while engaging it? Such exactly is as Duno is undertaking: she’s chosen a path; she’s following it.
So, too, has Danica Patrick.
Isn’t that what the U.S. is supposed to be about?
LASTLY: Compare Duno to, say, fellow Venezuelan Hugo Chavez. Who would you rather have hanging around pit road on race day?
Later,
DC
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