{"id":40760,"date":"2025-07-05T12:35:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-05T12:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/40760\/"},"modified":"2025-07-05T12:35:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-05T12:35:09","slug":"katherine-legge-ready-to-rumble-in-chicago-street-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/40760\/","title":{"rendered":"Katherine Legge ready to rumble in Chicago Street Race"},"content":{"rendered":"

Katherine Legge is used to being in the spotlight after years of driving Indy cars, so being the only woman competing in Sunday\u2019s NASCAR Chicago Street Race<\/a> would be no big deal.<\/p>\n

Legge, the only female NASCAR driver, will have to qualify Saturday for one of the final four spots in Sunday\u2019s Cup Series race. She understands the pressure that comes with being a unicorn in a male-dominated sport.<\/p>\n

\u201cI definitely think there is pressure, unfortunately, but I\u2019m kind of old news in the Indy car and sports car world because I\u2019ve been doing that for so long that I\u2019ve just become part of the furniture,\u201d Legge, 44, told the Tribune on Friday during a lull in preparations. \u201cSo I think I\u2019m relatively well-respected by everybody in the paddock \u2014 or I\u2019d like to think I was \u2014 just because I\u2019ve been doing it so long and they know what I\u2019m capable of driving-wise.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing over to NASCAR, with no one knowing me or what I\u2019m capable of, for sure I think it\u2019s added pressure. The spotlight is on. That would be for anybody new, but there\u2019s probably extra pressure because of the female piece. That\u2019s more from the periphery than the teams and the drivers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Legge, driving the No. 78 Live Fast Motorsports Chevrolet, will compete with four others for the four open spots in Sunday\u2019s Grant Park 165, the third and possibly final Chicago Street Race<\/a> after the city\u2019s three-year deal with NASCAR began in 2023.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a difficult challenge, especially because it\u2019s her first time racing on the Chicago course.<\/p>\n

\u201cRacing is very hard, depending on how big is your car,\u201d she said. \u201cWe could roll off the truck and the car could look really great and we\u2019re not worried about it. But I also have to get up to speed because it\u2019s new to me, and all these guys have been doing it every single week for multiple years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s twofold \u2014 how big is your car and how much experience do you have to put it in the show \u2014 so there\u2019s a lot of pressure on tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

Legge, who hails from Great Britain, has a lot of street-course experience from driving Indy and sports cars. She won three times on street courses in the 2005 Toyota Atlantic Championship \u2014 including her series debut in Long Beach, Calif. \u2014 and also won back-to-back years on a street course in Detroit in the IMSA SportsCar Championship.<\/p>\n

\n

2025 NASCAR Chicago Street Race: What to know about the 2.2-mile course around the city<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Learning a new track without practice time adds another degree of difficulty.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor people like me coming in, trying to learn the track, learn the cars, it\u2019s really tricky,\u201d she said. \u201cBecause these guys are in them every week and it\u2019s an extension of them, whereas for me everything is relatively new.<\/p>\n

\u201cExperience is everything in this sport. It\u2019s going to take a year or two for me to kind of come into my own.\u201d<\/p>\n

Can she count on her fellow drivers for advice, or is it dog eat dog?<\/p>\n

\u201cEven the drivers between themselves have their friends, their frenemies and their enemies,\u201d she said with a laugh. \u201cJust like in any job, there are people you get along with and people you don\u2019t get along with, and people that help you and some that are not (helpful). Racing is the same. Some have been awesome, some not, which is fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unlike baseball pitchers, NASCAR drivers are available to talk with fans and media almost right up until race time. It was shocking to interview racers minutes before they got into their cars, knowing a pitcher would get upset if any reporter talked to him three hours before a start.<\/p>\n

Somehow they\u2019re able to maintain their focus while also helping out the sport, which is made better by access.<\/p>\n

\"KatherineKatherine Legge signs autographs before a NASCAR Cup Series race March 9, 2025, at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, Ariz. (AP Photo\/Darryl Webb)<\/p>\n

\u201cNASCAR did that on purpose to make it accessible to fans,\u201d she said. \u201cThey want fans to be able to get autographs and talk, and that way they can feel more invested in your favorite drivers. \u2026 That accessibility is a selling point to get people to come to the track instead of just watching on TV. Of course it (affects the focus). But that\u2019s part of the job.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it was a new thing, yeah, absolutely it would. But we\u2019ve grown up with it, so it\u2019s trained into us.\u201d<\/p>\n

As an occasional NASCAR observer with little experience covering events, my favorite part of a race is when the drivers get in each others\u2019 faces after a wreck, sometimes leading to blows. It hasn\u2019t happened yet with Legge.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, but if it was to happen, I think it would be more on my side,\u201d she said with a laugh. \u201cI got taken out by (Carson) Hocevar in Mexico City, and I think Ricky (Stenhouse Jr.) was the only one that wanted to punch him. I wanted to know what happened, but the spotlight is on him for his craziness.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are some rivalries, of course, and NASCAR always wants to make a big deal out them because it\u2019s good for the fans. But you get over it pretty quickly because you travel so often with these guys. There are no guys that I really dislike yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s good to know she isn\u2019t ready to brawl in Chicago.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I\u2019m considering it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt might put me on the map.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chicago is on the auto racing map now as an annual NASCAR event, and except for the usual complaints about street closures<\/a>, along with this year\u2019s unexpected buckling on the course<\/a> due to a heatwave, things have gone fairly smoothly in Year 3.<\/p>\n

Chicago is ready, and the drivers are too.\u00a0Like everyone else, Legge is curious whether the city will continue to host a NASCAR street race<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you know?\u201d she asked. \u201cNobody knows at NASCAR.\u201d<\/p>\n

Knowing Chicago politics, it likely will be a hotly debated issue if Mayor Brandon Johnson desires a few more laps in the coming years.<\/p>\n

But after all of the controversy over its beginning<\/a>, the Chicago Street Race now seems like a special event many Chicagoans are getting used to. I\u2019d still prefer to see them race down regular city streets<\/a>, trying to avoid our own crazy drivers, bikers and double-parked delivery trucks.<\/p>\n

But you can\u2019t have everything.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Katherine Legge is used to being in the spotlight after years of driving Indy cars, so being the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":40761,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[20174,21890,21892,1406,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-40760","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-brandon-johnson","9":"tag-chicago-street-race","10":"tag-katherine-legge","11":"tag-nascar","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114800657909040481","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40760"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40760\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}