Some fun, some angst at Daytona
— -- DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- They are two of the sport's biggest stars who talked about their fears at the start of the 2015 racing season as they took their assigned spots during Daytona 500 media day.
Danica Patrick talked about her concern with the group qualifying format, which will set the grid for the Daytona 500 qualifying races.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. talked about his fear of jewelry.
So it was pretty easy to tell who is the defending Daytona 500 champion and who is without a contract for 2016.
Earnhardt, loose and enthusiastic, cracked jokes about an interview he did Wednesday where he indicated his jewelry phobia is what keeps him from proposing to longtime girlfriend Amy Reimann.
"My sister used to chase me around the house with necklaces and stuff," Earnhardt said. "It's creepy to me. I can be in the same room with it and it doesn't bother me on other people, but if you watch Amy, she doesn't really ever wear any. That's a dead giveaway. ... I told her my phobia and let her choose what she wanted to do."
No one talked jewelry with a polite and focused Patrick, who continued to answer the repetitive questions about her progress (and at the very least perceived lack of it) as well as the importance of this season as her deals with GoDaddy and Stewart-Haas Racing expire at the end of the year.
"It's freakin' February," Patrick said when asked if she was close to signing an extension.
The truth is that SHR drivers have said they like having Patrick as a teammate. They enjoy having her around. It will be a matter of whether GoDaddy wants to come back and for how many races, and then SHR trying to find sponsors for the rest.
"It's really a matter of cart and horse," she said. "It's sponsor and team. Both are happy, so it's a matter of getting GoDaddy in a place where they're happy and committing to something, and from my understanding the team wants that, too, and it's just a matter of time."
But first things first. Patrick, whose team finished 28th in the 2014 owner standings, is not guaranteed a spot in the field and would be perilously close to the cutoff if she doesn't post a fast speed in qualifying or run in the top 15 in her qualifying race.
The new group qualifying format that stymied some full-time competitors at Talladega (including Patrick's boyfriend Ricky Stenhouse Jr.) will be used to fill the front row and four spots near the rear of the field. So Patrick will have to make the right choices in the draft either in qualifying or the qualifying races -- or be in jeopardy of missing the Daytona 500.
"I am worried about qualifying," Patrick said. "It didn't go well at Talladega, and I don't see how it's going to go any different here at Daytona ... other than maybe people will be a lot more encouraged to work together and to stick with the plan.
"Other than that, luck of the draw."
Earnhardt knows about Daytona and creating one's own luck. He did that a year ago in winning the race. He has a new crew chief, a new car chief and three new over-the-wall pit-crew members.
But the Daytona aerodynamic rules package is the same as a year ago, and Earnhardt plans to have a fast car.
"I feel confident about what we did last year and that we can come in and be competitive, and we should be competitive with the equipment we've got, so that shouldn't be any issue," Earnhardt said. "I'll just get out there and make all the good decisions that I can in the draft and put myself up toward the front and try to work hard to stay there and really be mentally disciplined to fend off the challenges and all that stuff that we did in the race last year."
More of the Earnhardt talk on media day centered on how in the world is he ever going to propose to Reimann with that fear of jewelry.
Earnhardt said his fans have been more vocal in telling him he should get married since he turned 40 last October.
"I'm not going to be held accountable and she can do whatever she wants," Earnhardt said about the possibility of wearing a wedding ring. "I figure if we ever get to that step in life, I owe her that much. So I have to put up with that. But I'm free of all my obligations in that regard."
Seriously, a guy who drives at 200 miles an hour for a living has a fear of rings? Aren't these drivers supposed to be fearless?
That's what media day is for, in some ways showing that drivers are human as they embark on a season. Patrick reminded us that she has 36 weeks of racing before her contract expires. Earnhardt, in a less serious way, let us see into his soul.
And there was one other driver -- Jeff Gordon -- who talked about fear.
The four-time Cup champion will retire from full-time racing after this season. He has vowed that the 2015 Daytona 500 will be his last. He wouldn't rule out competing in other major NASCAR events, but he never will run another restrictor-plate race after Talladega in October.
"We are in a white-knuckle experience," Gordon said. "It's terrifying in some ways. It's hectic. It's physical. It's mental. The restrictor-plate tracks, for a guy that doesn't want to race full-time, that is not a desire that I have to put myself through that.
"I do it because that's what I am here to do. But if I had a choice, I would do it differently."
The 2015 season will be all about choices. The choices of management to pair certain drivers with crew chiefs. The choice of drivers on how to attack a certain track and when to make a move. Last year, some of those choices led to bloody lips. For Kevin Harvick, the choice of a lifetime to leave Richard Childress Racing for Stewart-Haas Racing turned into a championship.
It was a move that created a little bit of fear. As the drivers talked during media day, one thing was clear: It was time to embrace one's fears and throw the green on 2015.
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