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Written by:
Robin Miller
03/25/2007 - 07:00 PM
Indianapolis, IN
Duno has three career wins in two Rolex Series seasons. (LAT Photo) » More Photos
From the outside it looks like a nice surprise package for the Indy Racing League. New team, new driver and new sponsor. To quote IRL founder Tony George: "A very, very, very good day."
However, to anybody familiar with her experience and talent level, the thought of Milka Duno driving an Indy car next month in Kansas City is frightening. Or should be.
And the idea of an oil company (CITGO) owned and operated by anti-American Hugo Chavez sponsoring her car isn't exactly something to shout about either.
But the real concern should be on a 34-year-old sports car "specialist" who didn't start racing until 1999, has no high speed, open wheel experience and has never been on an oval track.
If you read Duno's the full page ad in Monday's USA Today, it's hard not to be dazzled. "Milka Duno is brilliant, fearless, beautiful and Venezuelan. And she's demonstrated a woman can rule in a male-dominated sport."
She's billed as the first woman to win a major sports car race and her credits include victories in Petite LeMans and Grand Am. Those aren't false claims because she was, indeed, on the winning team at Miami, Road Atlanta and Mt. Tremblant.
The fine print is that she didn't drive very many laps in any of them. Just like last Saturday's fourth place at Miami-Homestead in Grand Am, she logged 14 laps and teammate Patrick Carpentier did the other 77.
Or her second place at this year's Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona where
Olivier Beretta and Marc Goessens replace Marino Franchitti as Milka Duno's teammate on the No.8 Pontiac Riley. (LAT Photo) » More Photos
The perception is that Ms Milka is an accomplished racer. The reality is that she's not very good and not very well regarded by her sports car brethren. "She has trouble running side-by-side in these cars and I shudder to think what she'll be like with open wheels," said one veteran sports car racer. "She's a very nice person but she's got no business in an Indy car at 200 mph."
For the woman who ran mid-pack in the celebrity category of the annual Toyota Celebrity Race at Long Beach a few years ago, she does have the backing of CITGO and SAMAX Racing owner Peter Baron, whose rationale for moving her up to Indy cars left most of us shaking our heads.
"I have a fair amount of driving history behind me and I firmly believe that if you're going to drive an Indy car, and that's what you want to do, figure out how to get it done," replied Baron when asked why not try her in the Indy Pro Series first.
"Figure out how to do as much testing as you can. If you want to be an Indy car driver, if you can do it, the sooner you can do it, the more testing you can do behind it, the better off you will be. The best way to learn how to run 225 mph is to run 225 mph."
The idea that a few days of testing will prepare anybody for the full-throttle madness of Texas, Kansas City, Chicago and Homestead is absurd and the overall tone of last Friday's press conference was that this is going to be so much fun.
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