NASCAR: Chip Ganassi Racing rule out Danica Patrick for 2018 races

Chip Ganassi Racing have officially ruled out Danica Patrick driving for the team in 2018 in the signature NASCAR and IndyCar races, the Daytona 500 and the Indianapolis 500, respectively.

When Danica Patrick, 35, announced that the 2017 NASCAR Cup Series season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway in Homestead, Florida would be her final race as a full-time race car driver, ending a five-year stint as the driver of the #10 Ford for Stewart-Haas Racing, she also made another announcement.

She announced that she would not be immediately retiring. She announced that her retirement would officially come after she had raced in the 2018 Daytona 500 in the Cup Series and the 2018 Indianapolis 500 in IndyCar. She has not driven in IndyCar since 2011.

However, Patrick neglected to mention the teams for which she would be driving in those two races. The reason for this was the fact that she did not have anything lined up for either race at the time. Nearly two months later, she still doesn’t have anything lined up for either race, and things are not looking good for her, either.

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A few weeks ago, her talks with Chip Ganassi Racing came to a halt. There was speculation that she could race in both races for the team since the team are one of two teams with a team in both the Cup Series and IndyCar. The other team of that nature, Team Penske, are at capacity for the Indianapolis 500 with their three full-time drivers and three-time race winner Helio Castroneves, so they were pretty much ruled out from the start.

Earlier this week, Schmidt Peterson Motorsports ruled out her driving in the Indianapolis 500 for the team after it was speculated that she might end up there following the team’s deal with Didier Calmels to field Tristan Gommendy falling through, leaving her odds of landing a ride in that race extremely slim.

Now, her odds for landing a ride in either race got even slimmer. There is now no more communication between Patrick and Chip Ganassi Racing in regard to driving in the Daytona 500 and/or the Indianapolis 500 in 2018 — they have officially ruled out the possibility of her driving for them in either race.

Here is what Steve Lauletta, the president of Chip Ganassi Racing, had to say on the matter, according to NBC Sports.

"“We’re not talking any longer. I think it would have made sense, and we did have conversations if she wanted to run in both races, the Daytona 500 and the Indianapolis 500, and ultimately we couldn’t come to a solution that worked for both of us.“We’re going to stay focused on the task at hand…getting [Jamie McMurray] and [Kyle Larson] in Cup and the 42 in Xfinity into Victory Lane as much as we can with the hopes of winning a couple of championships. “The same on our IndyCar program. We have got two cars that were testing yesterday in Sebring. We’re going to stay focused on that rather than put another temporary effort together and not doing it up to the standards that we would want to, so I don’t think you’ll see that happening with us in 2018.’’"

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Things are not looking good for Danica Patrick in terms of landing rides for the 2018 Daytona 500 and Indianapolis 500. Will a deal or deals than get Patrick a ride in one or both of those races end up taking place, or is her racing career over right now? The situation is definitely unfolding, but there are still plenty of unknowns.

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