KATHERINE LEGGE’S NASCAR COMEBACK

Katherine Legge is breaking barriers and bumping bumpers.

Kather­ine Legge made his­to­ry on Sun­day, March 9, becom­ing the first woman since 2018 to com­pete in a NASCAR Cup Series race. The 44-year-old British rac­er took on the Shriners Children’s 500 at Phoenix Race­way, prov­ing once again that motor­sport isn’t just a boys’ club. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, her race end­ed ear­ly after an on-track tan­gle, but not before she made her mark.

A Tough Debut, but a Strong Show­ing

Legge start­ed her day behind the wheel of the No. 78 Chevro­let for Live Fast Motor­sports. She was run­ning 28th when things took a turn—literally. On lap 216, she made con­tact with anoth­er car, send­ing her into a spin. In the chaos, Daniel Suárez, who had been run­ning in sixth place, got caught up in the crash. That was the end of Legge’s day, but not her deter­mi­na­tion.

Lessons Learned, and a Fiery Bap­tism

Despite the crash, Legge found pos­i­tives in her Cup Series debut. “Bap­tism of fire. I think there’s a lot of pos­i­tives to take from it,” she told Fox Sports. “Obvi­ous­ly there were mis­takes made, but I learned so much and hope­ful­ly I get to come back and do it again.” That’s the spir­it of a racer—get knocked down, get back in the driver’s seat.

Rac­ing Against the Odds

Legge, who hails from Guild­ford, Eng­land, isn’t new to high-speed com­pe­ti­tion. She’s raced in mul­ti­ple series, includ­ing Indy­Car, where she set the fastest qual­i­fy­ing time by a woman at the Indi­anapo­lis 500 in 2023. But as she point­ed out before the race, women are still under­rep­re­sent­ed in motor­sports.

“It’s dis­ap­point­ing that there aren’t more women in Indy­Car, NASCAR Cup, sports cars,” she said. “I only have my own expe­ri­ence, but I know the strug­gles, and I know men­tal­ly what you have to do to over­come them.”

Look­ing Ahead

Will we see Legge back in the Cup Series? She cer­tain­ly hopes so. “I don’t think we have any expec­ta­tions that we’re going to go out and be com­pet­i­tive,” she admit­ted. “But if we fin­ish any­thing but last, that would be a win for us. Hope­ful­ly, we can devel­op me and the car at the same time and get there.”

Mean­while, Christo­pher Bell took the check­ered flag for his third straight win, join­ing an elite club of just 29 dri­vers to accom­plish the feat in NASCAR’s mod­ern era. Next up, the Cup Series heads to Las Vegas Motor Speed­way. As for Legge? Here’s hop­ing she gets anoth­er shot. This time, with a lit­tle less spin­ning.