Number 10 rising?

 
So I am an un apologetic and proud fan of Danica Patrick. There I said it. I admire her and I don't think she has it easy, despite the Twitter feeds and the Facebook messages I read. 

So I consider myself to be fair, levelheaded and un biased. If I am wrong normally I am the first to admit that. When Danica does not do to well in a race, I don't try to sweet talk it away or candy coat it. I say, " She had a bad race!" end of story. 

This got me thinking though. Are all these opinions of Danica, some good and others bad based on anything other than opinion? I mean we all have one. Some are valid, constructive, but most of them are uninformed, un constructive and to put it plainly resemble more of a prejudice than opinion. 

While discussing Danica on the DanicaPack Facebook group I was reminded by one of the members that Danica really has not had to many starts and in terms of drivers in NASCAR she finds herself in that area where she is no longer new, but she really isn't a part of the furniture yet... (So to speak!). I think that many people would disagree when I say she has probably been the most talked about driver in NASCAR. sometimes for the right reasons and many times for all the wrong reasons. Some criticism of her in my book has been completely fair and other criticism completely off the mark and uncalled for really.

I decided to have a look at this myself and I was surprised at what I found. 

For your convenience I have put a table of statistics for your enjoyment. 

So the first thing you will notice is that the stats are arranged with the best average finish on top. 

The first thing that just jumps out at you is that Jimmie Johnson wins on average every 7 races. That is astounding. Consider that Jeff Gordon has raced almost double the number of races that Jimmie has and on average wins every 8 races. 

However for me the most impressive is Kyle Larson. Yes he hasn't won a race as yet, but he has the 11th best average finish figure and he has only raced 40 races..... WOW. 

Getting back to Danica. 

For someone who has only competed in 82 races, she has a better Average finish than many drivers who have competed in more races including many drivers that have competed in less races than she has. 

I decided to do some research to see if there are many people who have taken longer to win a race than what she has raced currently and I found that a number of drivers that have won, have taken a long time to win and it seems that Danica is in good company.Regan Smith, David Ragan, Casey Mears, Aric Almirola,Michael Waltrip,A J Allmendinger,Paul Menard, and Marcus Ambrose to mention just a few. 

Of course many drivers have taken less races to win than she has, Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, Matt Kenseth to mention just a few. 

My personal opinion is that Danica is very definably not the best driver out there and she would probably be the first to admit that herself. She also very definably is not the worst driver out there. In my book she is very competitive at some tracks and not so competitive at others. She is not as consistent as she needs to be and she needs to work on her restarts cause she seems to loose light years on many of those to her competitors. 

If she was finishing 10 laps down race after race and 10 seconds a lap slower, I would be the first to say OK she needs to give up her seat. The truth is though that she runs competitive laps, she leads, she takes pole positions and yes she seems to be stronger on long tracks than the shorter ones, but she beats many drivers with much more experience than she has in plate racing on a weekly basis. 

In a race format where winning for the most seems to be a bit of a Lottery at times it surly is only a question of time before she also gets that first win. Who knows time will tell, but what is very real is that this year is very much a make or break year for Danica. I believe that she will rise to the occasion. 

Week after week I read the comments on Twitter and on Facebook and mostly the comments and opinions are un or miss informed or just completely biased. There are very few educated opinions about Danica. I wonder though if the haters realise that her fans dont take their comments seriosuly and considering that she just keeps bringing those sponsors in, neither do they take those comments to heart. While those comments are being made, she is usually working and working hard, being a role model to many young kids and an absolute inspiration to so many. Just perhaps that is part of the secret to her success? 

Love her or hate her .... one thing is for sure she has helped NASCAR just as much as NASCAR has helped her. The haters ....... well the haters better hope she doesn't win, cause when she does and perhaps becomes a regular winner, her popularity is really going to explode.

Have fun with the stats below, its very interesting to identify trends and draw your own conclusions. 

Driver	Races	Won	Top 5	Top 10	Pole	Laps	Laps Led	AvStart	AvFinish	Av Win
Jimmie Johnson	471	70	193	292	33	134911	17151	10.9	11.9	6.73
Jeff Gordon	761	92	320	454	77	218360	24664	10.4	12.4	8.27
Tony Stewart	554	48	182	297	15	158920	12759	15.4	13.2	11.54
Carl Edwards	373	23	108	187	13	107186	4842	15.3	13.5	16.22
Matt Kenseth	544	31	151	270	13	156023	9455	18.2	14.1	17.55
Kevin Harvick	502	28	114	229	14	145147	6563	17.2	14.2	17.93
Denny Hamlin	326	24	91	154	20	92513	7080	14.2	14.7	13.58
Clint Bowyer	325	8	56	152	2	92943	2324	16.6	14.7	40.63
Kyle Busch	365	29	118	178	16	101912	10242	13.8	15.2	12.59
Brad Keselowski	197	16	50	79	8	56400	3099	15.4	15.5	12.31
Kyle Larson	40	0	8	17	1	11147	54	16.6	15.7	0.00
Dale Earnhardt, Jr.	541	23	127	224	13	154613	7847	16.2	15.8	23.52
Greg Biffle	438	19	88	168	12	125172	5762	15.4	15.9	23.05
Ryan Newman	476	17	98	200	51	133784	4658	11.6	16.2	28.00
Jeff Burton	695	21	134	254	6	197010	6532	21.1	16.5	33.10
Terry Labonte	890	22	182	361	27	254874	7074	18.1	16.6	40.45
Joey Logano	219	8	43	82	8	62455	1653	15	16.7	27.38
Kurt Busch	507	25	106	201	16	143010	7835	15.7	17.3	20.28
Kasey Kahne	396	17	83	146	26	109882	4541	13.2	17.4	23.29
Martin Truex, Jr.	333	2	32	95	7	93485	1890	16.7	18.2	166.50
Jamie McMurray	438	7	52	121	11	123950	1853	19	18.9	62.57
Austin Dillon	49	0	1	4	1	13785	10	20	19.1	0.00
Bobby Labonte	721	21	115	203	26	202092	4056	19.4	19.5	34.33
Morgan Shepherd	517	4	63	168	7	133831	2155	19.6	19.7	129.25
Juan Pablo Montoya	255	2	24	59	9	72532	1124	17.9	19.8	127.50
Brian Vickers	316	3	29	77	12	88664	1242	17.4	20.1	105.33
Marcos Ambrose	227	2	18	46	3	63426	347	18.9	20.2	113.50
Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.	76	0	2	8	1	21600	35	20	20.8	0.00
Paul Menard	291	1	15	47	1	82197	282	20.8	21	291.00
A.J. Allmendinger	227	1	7	35	2	64052	409	20.1	21.2	227.00
Michael Waltrip	778	4	41	132	4	216003	1409	22.4	21.9	194.50
Aric Almirola	143	1	5	19	1	39092	170	20	22.3	143.00
Casey Mears	416	1	13	50	3	113681	473	24.1	23.4	416.00
David Ragan	290	2	14	35	2	80755	145	25.1	23.6	145.00
David Reutimann	235	2	12	26	4	64547	336	23.6	24	117.50
Regan Smith	172	1	3	11	0	47915	46	22.1	24.5	172.00
Ryan Blaney	2	0	0	0	0	457	15	12.5	24.5	0.00
Danica Patrick	82	0	0	4	1	23281	20	27.4	25.3	0.00
Sam Hornish, Jr.	131	0	3	9	0	35491	71	22.7	25.5	0.00
Boris Said	49	0	2	8	2	6737	32	23.7	25.8	0.00
Trevor Bayne	58	1	1	3	0	13433	29	20.5	26	58.00
Ty Dillon	2	0	0	0	0	642	0	27.5	26	0.00
Nelson Piquet, Jr.	1	0	0	0	0	90	0	32	26	0.00
Justin Allgaier	39	0	0	0	0	10778	16	26.3	26.4	0.00
Mike Wallace	196	0	3	14	0	53118	145	31.9	26.8	0.00
Reed Sorenson	225	0	5	15	1	55686	158	28.9	27.8	0.00
Kyle Fowler	1	0	0	0	0	491	0	42	28	0.00
Joe Nemechek	666	4	18	62	10	152840	1245	24.1	28.2	166.50
Dave Blaney	473	0	4	28	2	114407	301	28	28.2	0.00
David Gilliland	294	0	4	8	3	78834	69	30.9	28.3	0.00
Travis Kvapil	267	0	0	8	1	72438	99	32.4	28.4	0.00
Johnny Sauter	84	0	1	3	0	21241	7	31.8	29.1	0.00
Michael Annett	36	0	0	0	0	9750	5	33.7	29.4	0.00
David Stremme	200	0	0	3	0	48687	28	29.6	29.6	0.00
Eric McClure	3	0	0	0	0	607	1	34.3	29.7	0.00
Landon Cassill	151	0	1	1	0	37100	33	32.4	30.4	0.00
Cole Whitt	50	0	0	0	0	12543	1	33	31	0.00
J.J. Yeley	220	0	2	8	1	48452	72	31.2	31.1	0.00
Brian Scott	7	0	0	0	1	1836	0	21.4	31.6	0.00
Mike Bliss	169	0	1	7	0	33194	15	30.8	32.3	0.00
Alex Bowman	36	0	0	0	0	9878	0	33	32.6	0.00
Parker Kligerman	10	0	0	0	0	2920	0	35	34.1	0.00
Eddie MacDonald	1	0	0	0	0	300	0	40	35	0.00
Timmy Hill	35	0	0	0	0	7905	0	40.4	35.4	0.00
Brett Moffitt	7	0	0	0	0	1863	0	34.4	35.4	0.00
Josh Wise	104	0	0	0	0	18732	4	34.1	35.5	0.00
Alex Kennedy	8	0	0	0	0	841	0	39.6	35.5	0.00
Ryan Truex	26	0	0	0	0	6411	0	34.8	35.7	0.00
Joey Gase	4	0	0	0	0	1108	0	42.5	36	0.00
Blake Koch	6	0	0	0	0	1876	1	41.5	36.2	0.00
Michael McDowell	166	0	0	2	0	20871	21	31.8	37	0.00
Corey LaJoie	2	0	0	0	0	527	0	41.5	38	0.00
Tomy Drissi	4	0	0	0	0	333	0	41.8	39	0.00
Clay Rogers	2	0	0	0	0	70	0	35.5	43	0.00