Lady Lynx--The Fastest Girl at Pikes Peak
25 June 1999
- Sara Senske is one of auto racing's fastest-rising female drivers, and
runs for Lynx Racing, a championship-winning driver development program
owned by two women, Peggy Haas and Jackie Doty.
- Lynx Racing alumni include CART FedEx drivers Patrick Carpentier, Alex
Barron and Memo Gidley.
- The Star Mazda Series in which Senske competes is the first step on the
'ladder' that leads to the upper levels of auto racing. She also drove
in the inaugural race of the all-new Women's Global GT Series.
- Senske qualified on the front row of the Star Mazda race here last year,
and finished third. She is currently sixth in the 1999 championship
points battle.
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Most auto racing stories are about men... but not this one.
Sara Senske, 20, of Kennewick, Washington, won her first race at
age 8 and is now one of the fastest-rising stars in auto racing where she
drives for Lynx Racing, a championship-winning team owned by two women,
Peggy Haas and Jackie Doty. She will be competing this weekend in the Star
Formula Mazda support race at the Radisson 200 IRL event at Pike's Peak
International Raceway, June 26 - 27.
She is currently sixth in the 1999 championship points battle, and,
at this event last year, qualified on the front row and finished third in
the Star Mazda race at Pike's Peak International Raceway last year.
"Racing in front of all the IRL teams here is a great opportunity for a
driver on the way up," says Senske. "Of course you have to do well, and
with the help of my sponsors at Lynx Racing and the championship-winning
crew at S3 Racing who prepare my car, I have all the tools to go for a win
here. We've worked hard in testing, and I've worked hard on my physical
training program to get ready for the altitude, and now it's time to go out
a show what we can do."
Lynx Racing's mission is to seek out young drivers with the potential to
make it to the top of the sport, and provide them with the resources,
funding and training to realize that potential. Past graduates of the Lynx
Racing program include Patrick Carpentier, Alex Barron and Memo Gidley, all
of whom now drive in the CART FedEx Championship.
The Star Mazda Series utilizes single-seat, open-wheel 'formula'
cars that are similar, though smaller and less powerful, to those that run
in the CART or the IRL. Their place in the big picture of racing might
best be described in baseball terms -- if CART and IRL are the major
leagues, driving in the Star Mazda Series is the high school varsity team.
The next step up is college varsity, the U.S. F2000 series, followed by the
triple-A KOOL/Toyota Atlantic Championship.
Lynx Racing has affiliated teams at each level, and Senske is being
groomed to rise through the ranks, with the ultimate goal of becoming the
first female driver to win an Indy-car race and championship.
"We chose Sara not because she's female, but because we saw in her
that special something that we've come to recognize as championship
potential," says Lynx Racing co-owner Peggy Haas. "We've always wanted a
woman driver on the team, but we weren't willing to sign someone for that
reason alone. Lynx drivers have to be capable of taking the opportunity
and knowledge we give them and rising to the top levels of the sport, and
Sara has that quality."
When not behind the wheel of her racing car, Senske is a student
who pursues her interests in communications and sports marketing at
Whitworth College in Spokane, Washington. Her hobbies include ice skating,
rollerblading, skiing, biking, writing poetry and listening to contemporary
Christian, jazz and classical music. She counts the Bible as the greatest
influence on her life, and Indy 500 driver Lyn St. James as her 'racing
hero.' Her favorite TV show is "I Love Lucy," her favorite food is Thai
and the thing about her that would surprise people is that she can juggle.
If she couldn't be a racing driver, she'd like to be on the Olympic Women's
Hockey Team.
Senske is one of two Lynx Racing 'road scholars,' who benefit from
a fully-funded program. The other Lynx driver is Buddy Rice, 23, of
Phoenix, Arizona, who drives in the KOOL/Toyota Atlantic series. He was
the first rookie in the series' 25-year history to put his car on the pole
in his first Atlantic race... and then won his second race, on the Nazareth
oval, also from the pole. Rice is currently second in the 1999 KOOL/Toyota
Atlantic Championship points battle with podium finishes in the last two
races.
Rice's teammate on the Lynx Atlantic team is Mike Conte, a 30
year-old computer wizard who, while working for MicroSoft, was involved in
the development of several of their most popular software programs. Conte
also competes in sports car racing, and scored a podium finish in this
year's 12 Hours of Sebring driving a Porsche entered under his Contemporary
Motorsports banner.
Editors Note: For hundreds of hot racing photos and racing art, be sure to visit The Racing ImageGalleries and the Visions of Speed Art Gallery.