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"         As I look back on my career, I really believed at the start that if I had a chance I could make it, that I could be a big deal. I believed in my abilities, that I could do a good job. I never ever thought of doing anything else. I don&amp;#039;t think I had to perform better as a woman. I think that maybe I had to do something more than once because, if I didn&amp;#039;t, my good performances could be seen more as flukes or something like that. I had to prove myself more than the guys.   But I get along with all the men on my team. We work together, and I think we&amp;#039;ve had a pretty good season this year, at least until we hit the road course stretch of the season. Road courses definitely are more physical. It&amp;#039;s left, it&amp;#039;s right, it&amp;#039;s shifting, it&amp;#039;s accelerating, it&amp;#039;s decelerating. There are a lot of things going on. Yet the whole time the car wants to go straight so you have to make it do everything unlike on ovals, where it&amp;#039;s set up to turn only left. Not that ovals are easy. Actually, what they are is relentless. It&amp;#039;s the same motion over and over again, which can be tiring. But in terms of sheer exertion, road courses definitely are more physical. And yet it&amp;#039;s funny, because I&amp;#039;ve had some great results on road courses. Go figure.   In general, though, my oval-track racing is better because I tend to race from the front and stay up there. But on road courses, well, sometimes it&amp;#039;s about strategy. Sure, you still have to hang on once you get up there and my race pace has always been all right. But this year it&amp;#039;s been tough. We&amp;#039;ve been struggling with grip and everything and most of you know that when it comes to qualifying, grip is number one. It&amp;#039;s what allows you to go faster. That&amp;#039;s why our race pace is okay. But it&amp;#039;s the qualifying that&amp;#039;s been off. I saw a quote from Mike [Andretti, team owner] who said, &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s not the drivers.&amp;quot; That definitely makes us feel good because we&amp;#039;re working hard and trying to do the best job that we can. But when all the drivers on our team are sort of 16th through 20th in qualifying it&amp;#039;s unsettling, especially when you&amp;#039;ve got a guy like Tony Kanaan on the team who you know can qualify up front. But we know that by working together, we get stronger, so that&amp;#039;s always the goal.   Speaking of goals, I think I&amp;#039;ve done a pretty good job this year of keeping my temper under control. Problem is, I&amp;#039;m still Danica and I still think like her. So if I get taken out while leading the race, you better believe you&amp;#039;re gonna see that temper again. But I think I&amp;#039;ve learned how to keep quiet and to let my people answer questions for me, especially in situations that aren&amp;#039;t a big deal. In the past, I wasted a lot of energy and earned a sort of bad rap for my temper. Sure, I got a lot of publicity. You can get attention for negative things for a while. But all of a sudden people don&amp;#039;t want to deal with you anymore. So my goal is to get attention for the positive things that I do, like having a better attitude, controlling my anger and letting things slide a little bit more. Trust me, though, underneath it all I&amp;#039;m still the same person. My temper is not gone, it&amp;#039;s just contained.   One thing I haven&amp;#039;t tried to contain is doing things that I think will be fun, things that allow me to express a different side of my personality. I&amp;#039;ve had a really great time doing the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue the last two years, and I wouldn&amp;#039;t change that for anything. I&amp;#039;m well aware of some people passing judgment on certain types of photo shoots or commercials, and I guess I&amp;#039;m flattered that someone would take the time to talk about me in even a negative way. I don&amp;#039;t know what those folks think about me, but I don&amp;#039;t care.   What I do care about is how this season plays out. Yeah, we have had some issues. But we&amp;#039;re a strong team, a good team with a lot of smart people. We&amp;#039;ll get it figured out. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.roadandtrack.com/motorsports/news/a15011/danica-patrick/>