Across the early months of 2015 Danica Patrick couldn't avoid wondering if much of what she knew in NASCAR might be slipping away.
GoDaddy, her chief sponsor for the past nine years, was transitioning as a company right as their sponsorship deal for her car needed to be negotiated. And the process, Patrick said, was frustrating.
"Well, we definitely got strung along for a really long time last year about re-upping," Patrick told Yahoo Sports Friday as she prepared for Sunday's Daytona 500. "It was excuse after excuse about, 'We're working on this; we're working on that; we're going public; we've got a lot going on.' Once that goes on long enough, you start to realize you're getting strung along.
"So I had a bad feeling about it."
Her concerns were about more than just a potential split with GoDaddy, which she'd become almost synonymous with over the years. She's appeared in more Super Bowl commercials than any person ever, all of them for the company. If the sponsorship evaporated, then so too could her roster spot on the elite Stewart-Haas Racing team.
That's how the business of motorsports works: no money, no guarantees. Patrick still believed she was growing as a driver, as she'd only driven stock cars full time since 2011. Changing teams might stunt that development.
"Sure I was worried," Patrick said. "My contract was up with GoDaddy and my contract was up with the team. It's a business. It makes sense. So I was definitely a little bit worried … it was definitely a concern. I mean, they can tell you all they want you on the team, but I heard all the rumors about Clint [Bowyer] coming to the team and all the different things that made me nervous."
One worry begat the other.
A delay with GoDaddy made a delay with Stewart-Haas seem even more troubling then it actually may have been. Patrick is a big enough star and a good enough driver that she was going to get a ride somewhere, but for someone so focused on making this work, for making everything work, anything other than staying the course was unsettling.
Then GoDaddy, no longer under the control of founder and Danica fan Bob Parsons, confirmed Patrick's suspicions.
In late April a call was scheduled and new management announced the days of sponsoring her car were over, although they held out the promise of a personal promotional deal. That deal has yet to materialize, however.
"I think it was like a half-ass break-up," Patrick said. "It's disappointing. … They called and said they are not going to sponsor the car anymore but they want to stay with me and they want to keep going and there is a lot of value in that relationship. But there is no personal deal [signed yet] so I'm beginning to think that they were just lying about that too, and they just wanted to soften the blow and that they really don't want to do a personal deal. That's what it seems like.
"It's a little frustrating. It's a little disappointing. I guess it would be easier for me to understand if they were just moving on then it would be to accept they strung me along and then strung me along on a personal side sponsorship, too."
With GoDaddy gone, everything was in flux. A new major, primary car sponsor requiring upward of $20 million annually was needed. It presented a bit of a Catch-22. Without a sponsor lined up, would Stewart-Haas keep her? Yet without the top-line equipment and crew of Stewart-Haas, would a major sponsor want to commit to her?
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Patrick, 33, is small in stature but undeniably tough – physically, mentally and emotionally. You don't climb to this level of the alpha-male dominated world of motorsports any other way.
Critics of her inability to compete for championships ignore not just her development as a driver, but the sheer fearlessness required to attempt this pursuit, bumper to bumper along a concrete wall at 200 miles per hour. This is the real deal.
At the time of the GoDaddy announcement, she was in the top 16 of the standings, holding two top-10 finishes during the early part of the season. And while no one expects her to win a Sprint Cup championship this season, no one would deny she has the potential to contend for a spot in the Chase, the playoff series for the top 16 cars.
She may not be the best driver out there. She is a legitimate driver, though, maybe more legitimate by the race.
She got this far by learning to not let the boys see her rattled. This was a challenge to maintain, though. Her future became a topic of track gossip. Suddenly she couldn't find a way to simply outwork the issue. Frustration mounted, especially because she'd been so good for GoDaddy and GoDaddy had been so good for her.
At the time of the split in April, the company enjoyed brand awareness with 81 percent of Americans, according to USA Today. Conversely, it had spent millions not just promoting itself, but in the process on Patrick herself, a value not lost on the driver.
Much of that was under Parsons, though. He sold a portion of the company in 2011 to a private equity firm who took it public in early 2015.
"I still have a great relationship with Bob," Patrick said. "It's not him who is making those decisions. I definitely don't want it to sound in the article like Bob Parsons [was] stringing me along, it's the other people in the company that [were] stringing me along. "… I would say I look back at great memories and I'm grateful for almost 10 years of a great partnership and great promotions and great branding and recognize-ability and publicity and my ability to be recognized in awareness surveys," Patrick said. "So those are cool things. So I'm not bitter about that at all … but I just don't appreciate feeling like I've been lied to."
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It took only a matter of months, impressively fast by industry standards, for a new sponsor to be found.
Nature's Bakery, a company created in 2010 to produce healthy snacks, was looking to increase its profile nationally.
Driver and company signed a multiyear deal in August. The neon green of GoDaddy would be replaced by the soft blue and white tones of Nature's Bakery on her car.
"It is going to look great against my skin tone," Patrick cracked at the announcement last August.
Patrick is a noted fitness buff, especially focused on healthy eating and the power of yoga, which she promotes on her highly followed social media. It is natural to see her one day at the center of a fashion and fitness empire. This points in that direction.
"It is a very authentic partnership," Patrick said. "Their business is booming. I know their business is going to grow. I know that is going to happen. My goal is for it to grow so fast even they are surprised."
More importantly for her present, the Nature's Bakery deal coincided with Stewart-Haas announcing a multiyear contract extension, meaning Patrick can continue to pursue her potential in familiar grounds on one of the sport's best teams.
It ended months of uncertainty in one swoop.
"The team kept faith and wanted to see our program through and wanted to see me continue to improve and keep me on the team and the marketing department worked very hard and Tony [Stewart] wanted me to stay," Patrick said. "I'm grateful for that. There was a concern but they worked really hard and I feel really lucky that I didn't have to wait longer than the summer to know what was going to happen." The Clint Bowyer rumor even proved true … sort of. He'll join the team next year, replacing Stewart who will retire after the 2016 season.
Patrick is focused on the here and now, on small steps and small gains that can hopefully lead to something special. She's here with the same car, but a new paint job, a different sponsor, but a renewed sense of comfort and confidence. NASACR is a business and it is a business that has been very, very good for Danica Patrick.
But at the core it's about the racing, and that's what motivates her, that's how she wants to be known. She has never lost the drive to prove herself, and she's pushing for her best season yet.
And that starts Sunday in the Daytona 500.
If nothing else, after 2015, she appreciates the calm of a new year.
"It feels fresh," Patrick said. "I think that's probably the best word for it. It's fresh. And it's fun."
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