“When we signed our agreement to host a three-year event at Barber Motorsports Park, Danica did not have her contract at that point signed to extend for the next 3 years,” Hallman said. “And Danica, I don’t know if it’s proper to pray for these sort of things, but I prayed.”
Hallman and the rest of the team at Barber Motorsports Park received a positive response to those prayers — Patrick, who has become the face of open-wheel racing and is dabbling in NASCAR, did sign a new deal to continue in the Indycar series. She was on hand last Wednesday to speak to a packed room for a media event to promote the upcoming Grand Prix of Alabama, set to begin Friday, April 9.
“I don’t know if it’s debatable whether you can pray for you to sign your contract, but our prayers came true,” Hallman said to Patrick. “Boy did they come true – and thank you, very much, for being with us at least 3 more years on this wonderful circuit.”
The media event was part of a short break Patrick — who is known around the nation and the rest of the world as a driver, a model and a multimedia personality — took from testing for the upcoming race.
“I think that one of the things that stands out about Barber Motorsports Park is that every time we’ve been here, there have always been fans out at the track,” Patrick said. “I think that’s really one of the big things that drew us to come here. Our cars are very high performance, cool things to see out there. And to give people that chance to see us is good.
“We want to go places that we’re wanted, and we really felt wanted here,. So I appreciate everything you guys do. This morning I saw an ad already for the April race. I was happy to see that; I’m happy to see you guys trying to promote the event and sell tickets.”
Hallman said the promotion has gone very well thus far – all RV and motor home spots for the April race are sold out, and tickets have been purchased in 32 different states.
“We’re the only race in the Deep South,” he said. “We’re gonna draw fans from all over the Southeast and beyond. So it’s a very exciting time for us here in Birmingham.
“This is our first-ever event, and we were very nervous going into it. This is the heart of NASCAR country. But it is clear, abundantly clear, there’s plenty of room for open-wheel racing to succeed and flourish, and (Patrick is) a very large part of that.”
The race has been promoted as a “loud version of the Kentucky Derby,” and has attracted the attention of not just Patrick but a number of the Indycar Series’ top stars — Helio Castroneves, Dario Franchitti and Will Power were just a few of the names testing last week.
“It’s nice to be able to test at a track that we’re gonna race at,” Patrick said. “That doesn’t happen all the time. A lot of times we go to Homestead and drive the road course on the oval there, and that’s kind of our ‘spring training’ for the season. It’s nice to be at a track that we will come back to, that actually means something.
“It’s a little cold, so what’s the deal with that? I thought Alabama was supposed to be warm.”
Patrick – the first woman to claim victory in a closed-course event (in April 2008 in Japan) — received the endorsement of Hallman, and said a victory at the road-course event at Barber would be a giant feather in her cap.
“I think that, amongst all of us in the team, we think this is going to be a big race,” she said. “So it would be really nice if I could stand on that podium at the April event.”
Tickets are available through www.barbermotorsportspark.com.
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