Danica Patrick is ‘so bad’ and sick: need your support

The star driver, who came over from IndyCar in 2013 as a marquee attraction and women’s trail-blazer, vented her frustrations about another lost season on a recent episode of the “NASCAR on NBC” podcast.

“It’s just not much fun,” Patrick said. “Running in the top 15 every weekend would be so much more fun.

“It’s just so much more competitive [to be on the] lead lap, something on the line every time, instead of terrible races where things don’t go well because things just sucked that day. I do just really, really hope it goes better. I care so much about it, it breaks my heart every Sunday when it doesn’t go well.”

According to NBC, Patrick — in her fourth full NASCAR Sprint Cup season — finished with a career-best average finish of 22nd place (right in the middle of the standard 43-car field), but she did not record a single top-10 finish. Her biggest area of regression came in qualifying, where she dropped to an average starting position of 25th.

Patrick, 34, hoped she turned the corner, so to speak, at the season’s second-to-last race in Phoenix, where she qualified in 16th. But she finished the race in a disappointing 29th place.

“[It] might have been my worst ever Cup race,” Patrick said. “I felt so, so, so slow. The car would not turn. … I just get so sad now.”