This hasn’t been an optimal start to the 2012 IZOD IndyCar Series for Katherine Legge, who is listed as rookie driver for Dragon Racing’s No. 6 TrueCar Dallara/Lotus/Firestone Indy car. After two races, she’s tied for 21st in the point standings with another female driver, Simona de Silvestro, who also drives a Lotus-powered Indy car.
Legge, the first woman to win in the Atlantic Championship in 2005, posted three victories that season for Polestar Racing Group – at Long Beach, Edmonton and San Jose. “Those Atlantic wins changed everything and it’s the reason I’m here right now,” Legge said as she watched Toyota Pro-Celebrity practice on the Long Beach 1.97-mile, 11-turn street course abutting the Pacific Ocean. “I came over a cocky English gal thinking I can win this, it’s nothing,” she recalled. “Second place wasn’t even an option!”
One year after her debut in Atlantic where she finished third in the championship, earning the BBS Rising Star Award and a test with Minardi Formula One at the Italian Vallelunga road course, Legge found herself driving a Champ Car for PKV Racing. Filled with confidence she thought, “Sure, I can drive a Champ Car, even though I’ve only done one full season in Atlantic. I thought it would be no problem for me, but I probably should have done another season in Atlantic before I moved up. I learned from that but you know about 20-20 hindsight… ”
So she moved into the big cars and earned an eighth place finish at Long Beach, together with a sixth-place run on the very difficult Milwaukee Mile, finishing 16th in the standings. “I’m really grateful to Kevin Kalkhoven for the opportunity to drive the Champ Car; again, the ego thing comes into play. It was here at Long Beach that I realized I can drive a race car and that I am competitive.”
Her second, 2007 season in Champ Car came with Dale Coyne Racing where Legge finished sixth in the season-opening Las Vegas race on a mishmash of streets near the Las Vegas strip. She completed the last full season for the series in 15th place, then went to the DTM where she made similar finishes, racing through the 2010 season.
At that point, Legge wanted to return to the USA and decided to spend the 2011 being present at races and knocking on doors.
Being in-sight and in-mind, she found her ride for 2012 with Jay Penske’s Dragon Racing, teammate to four-time Champ Car titleholder Sebastien Bourdais, also recovering from some hard knocks in F1 and in sports cars, and a partial 2011 season with Coyne while also working with Peugeot Sport Total.
It hasn’t been smooth sailing in the first two races of the IZOD IndyCar Series season. Katherine had a DNF in the first race at St Petersburg, FL the final weekend of March and she was the final car running in last weekend’s second contestat Barber Motorsports Park. “It remains to be seen whether I can win in the ‘big cars’ but I can certainly drive them mid-pack, so let’s build on that, work on that and get it done,” she stated.
The problems facing Katherine Legge – and all five drivers using Lotus engines – has been the uncertainty and late arrival of engines.
Katherine Legge in action – Anne Proffit photoThe two Dragon Racing drivers shared a car for their first test, with Bourdais using the single unit on Friday morning during the INDYCAR open Sebring test and Legge getting her first time behind the wheel that afternoon. Following the test, the engine in their shared car was returned to Lotus – to Engine Developments Ltd in the UK – to be examined and rebuilt.
Katherine Legge’s Honda Grand Prix of St Petersburg Lotus engine arrived the Wednesday before the race while Sebastien Bourdais’ unit wasn’t in the garage area until Thursday evening, leaving the Dragon Racing team hustling to get both ready in time for first practice late morning Friday. “We haven’t had engines and we haven’t had time to go testing in the car, so we’re learning on a race weekend.
“The team has done a great job; we haven’t had any mechanical issues per se – and the team has done a really good job of putting together a car I can really drive around. That was the main objective: just to finish,” she said.
“My problem has been engine management issues. We’ve had problems where it would shut off every time we came into the pit lane. There was a problem with the boost. We have a lot of different problems to contend with. They are still working and they know what most of the issues are now. Just figuring it all out and getting it fixed…
“It’s not easy to keep my attitude up but the guys are intelligent people, understand it and are in for the long haul. They understand and they know that it will get better so we’re all kind of helping each other out. I would say we have a really good team of people because we’re all – I’m smiling you know – we’re all happy to be there and it’s going to get better,” she declared.
There are no Lotus-powered cars at the current Indianapolis Motor Speedway oval test that is verifying Dallara’s superspeedway aero kit, as IndyCar official Will Phillips works to put cars on the 2.5-mile historic oval that are capable of lapping at 225 mph. Neither Katherine Legge nor Sebastien Bourdais had engines available to take them to IMS – or to the Infineon Raceway Sears Point road course test next week prior to the Long Beach race.
“I’ve had a few knocks since [leaving Champ Car] and, shall we say I’m very humbled by it and very grateful I’m here. I for sure am lucky. The confidence will come back as soon as we start to get some results. I believe in myself; I believe in the team; I’m older and a bit more seasoned,” Legge said.
As both the IZOD IndyCar Series and Katherine Legge return to Long Beach for the 38th annual Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, the British driver is ripe to repeat her fine finishes on this track. “I’ve had good fortune here,” she reminded, “but you know the car has to roll off the truck and it has to be fast. It has to be drivable because you can’t be playing catch-up all weekend. Otherwise you never get there. I’ve been very lucky to be given good race cars here at Long Beach,” Legge remarked as she eyed other drivers making laps in anticipation of their races next weekend. “As long as we’re improving and getting better, that’s all that counts.”