Katherine Legge: If It Has Wheels – She’ll Drive It!

This past weekend, an all-female team took on the challenge of the Rolex 24 Hour. In October of last year, Meyer Shank Racing announced the formation of an all-female team for IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in the GTD class. The team is led by and will race under the banner of, Jackie Heinricher’s race team: Heinricher Racing. The team will include Jackie, Katherine Legge, Bia Figueiredo (Ana Beatriz), and Simona De Silvestro. Katherine Legge – this woman will drive anything with wheels on it, and by the way, she’s not bad at it either.

In 2000, Katherine drove in the British Formula Ford series, becoming the first woman to achieve a pole. She moved onto British Formula Renault the next year. During her first year in the series, she bet Kimi Raikkonen’s lap record, and of course achieved the pole. The following year she received the British Racing Drivers Club “Rising Star” and looked over to the US and American open-wheel.

Katherine’s journey in American open-wheel is one of those paths that starts and stops, and doglegs a few times. She started in Champ Car in 2005, and in her rookie year obtained three victories, five podiums, and achieved a third place finish. She was the first woman to compete full time in the Champ Car season. After a break, Katherine returned to American open-wheel in the INDYCAR series, driving for Dragon Racing in the 2012-2013 season. Katherine, and her teammate Sebastian Bourdais, had to suffer through the Lotus engine troubles. Then the team could only afford one engine, so the two shared a ride. Katherine handled the ovals and Bourdais handled road courses. Katherine attempted the Indianapolis 500 the next year with Schmidt Peterson Motorsport. Finally in 2015 there was the ill-fated Grace Autosport that never materialized.

She has nearly driven everything with four wheels. She tested with Mirandi in Formula 1 in 2005 (the last woman to do so was Sarah Fisher in 2012). She drove DTM from 2008-2010. She drove the DeltaWing prototype car. Led an American Le Mans Race…oh and this year she drove in a few NASCAR races. If you’ve been counting on your fingers, I think you’ve ran out.

Everyone adapted very well and Katherine (Legge) has been a great resource for everyone, especially with her knowledge of the NSX. (Micheal Shank)

Katherine Legge 2018

Katherine seems to have found herself in IMSA. She signed on to Michael Shank Racing in 2017. She finished the season 6th overall, getting wins at the Detroit and Watkins Glen races. In 2018 she finished the season second overall clenching first place again in Detroit and in Laguna Senca. Also in 2018 she came in second in her class (GTD) at the Rolex 24 Hour.

In 2019, the all female team with MSR came in 13th in their class and 33rd overall. With this year’s Rolex being full of cautions and cars in all sorts of trouble, not receiving a DNF is a feat. The car did get damage though, while Katherine was driving, but the car got back on the track and finished the race. That is Katherine- she will finish the race.

At the 2019 Rolex I, and co-host Abby, were interviewed by the BBC where they said they were here covering Katherine Legge. She’s kind of a big deal.

“And I am like, ‘No, that is not true. We can if we are given the opportunity to prove that we can do it.’.”

 

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Source

http://www.therepublic.com/2019/01/14/car-imsa-all-female-team/