Winning for the first time in last month's Motegi IndyCar round was expected to lift the weight of expectation from Danica Patrick's shoulders, but the Andretti Green Racing driver insists that little has changed.
While she may not face any more questions about when she is going to win, Patrick admits that the pressure to succeed remains, even if most of it comes from within as she continues to battle in a largely male-orientated world.
"I don't feel any different," she maintained, "I still get nervous, I feel just as much pressure to do well every time I get on the track. It's nice to have that win, and it's nice to answer new questions now, but that's kind of all that does. It's just good championship points, but we fell out with a mechanical problem at Kansas, so we've got some ground to make up."
Moving onto the Indianapolis 500, Patrick says that she is looking forward to getting on with the business of preparing for qualifying this weekend, and then gearing up for the biggest event of the year in a fortnight's time.
"I'm excited about this month - I love coming here, it's like a second home to me," she insists, "We had a decent day today, and got out with a couple of minutes to go and turned our quickest lap of the day on our own. We're pleased, but we've got a little bit more work to do.
After complaining about various drivers during the Kansas race, Patrick again encountered traffic in practice, but remains confident that she can shoot for pole on Saturday.
"I ran into one car doing a sticker [tyre] run on my second flying lap," she reported, "He was really slow through three and four but, if I see a car coming, I try to either speed up or slow down. He pretty much stayed on line, and I think I slowed down 15mph on that lap.
![Danica Patrick - Andretti Green Racing [pic credit: IRL/Snoddy]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/436633.jpg)
