Sarah Fisher

At just 29 years old, Sarah Fisher has already competed in eight Indianapolis 500’s, been voted “Most Popular Driver” four times in two separate Series (IndyCar and NASCAR), been awarded an Advertising Age ‘Marketing 100’ award and enters her third season as a team owner in the IZOD IndyCar® Series in 2010. Fisher is the first woman to qualify fastest for a major North American open-wheel event, the fastest woman to ever qualify for the Indianapolis 500, the youngest woman to compete at the legendary Indianapolis Motor Speedway in its 100-year history and the youngest team owner in the history of the IZOD IndyCar Series. Fisher has been a guest or profiled on a variety of national platforms such as, LIVE! with Regis & Kelly, The Tonight Show, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Today Show, The Price is Right, VH1’s Top 20 Countdown, Jeopardy!, Glamour, People, INC Magazine and Fast Company, to name a few. In 2008, she formed her own race team: Sarah Fisher Racing (SFR), and made her first start as a team owner in the IZOD IndyCar Series’ Indianapolis 500. In May 2009, Fisher made her eighth start in the Indianapolis 500, marking the most number of starts for a woman in the 93-year history of the race. In 2010, Fisher will compete in a nine-race schedule with backing from Dollar General and attempt to qualify for her ninth Indianapolis 500 on May 15, 2010. For more information, please visit Sarah Fisher online at http://www.sarahfisher.com.

Sarah Fisher returns for her third consecutive year under the umbrella of Sarah Fisher Racing (SFR) in the 2010 IZOD IndyCar® Series. Fisher is completing an abbreviated schedule this season, making nine on the IZOD IndyCar Series schedule, which includes the 94th running of the Indianapolis 500®.

Fisher has already qualified for eight Indy 500’s, been voted the Most Popular Driver four times and enters her third season as a team owner. After the 2008 Indy 500, she was No. 2 on Yahoo.com’s top searches, nationally; trumping the 32 other drivers, including the races’ winner, Scott Dixon.

A resident of Indianapolis, Ind., Fisher competed in her first Indy 500 at age 19. After the race, Fisher traded stories with Regis and Kelly on LIVE!, joked with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show and participated in photo spreads for Glamour and People. Now she talks business with the likes of Forbes Magazine and Fast Company, and trades fashion tips with EXTRA’s Carlos Diaz. Engine manufacture, Honda Motor Company, has placed Fisher in prime time television slots in its national ads but, down home, it’s all about the racing. Today, you’ll find her behind the wheel of her No. 67 Dollar General-sponsored IZOD IndyCar Series car and, through her strong foothold in North American auto racing, she benchmarked her 24 years of racing experience to create a platform unlike any other in motorracing, having launched SFR, and becoming the only female team owner and the youngest team owner in the paddock.

In 2000, she became the third woman and one of the youngest drivers to compete in the world's greatest race: the Indy 500. Fisher continued to make history that year at Kentucky Speedway, becoming the youngest person to lead laps during an IZOD IndyCar Series event and the first woman to stand on the podium, with her third-place finish. In 2001, Fisher claimed second-place at Homestead-Miami Speedway, marking her best career finish at the professional level. In 2002, Fisher became the first woman to qualify fastest for a major open-wheel event, not only in this country, but in the world, when she claimed the pole position and set a new track record, still unmatched by any other driver. She did all this, while appearing in her first Super Bowl advertisement. In 2003, she became the fastest female on four wheels when she qualified for her fourth consecutive Indy 500, at a speed of 229.439 miles per hour.

Fisher signed with Kelley Racing to make her fifth successive start in the Indy 500 in 2004 before accepting an invitation from one of NASCAR’s legendary teams, Richard Childress Racing, to test out the possibilities of a NASCAR phase of her career in the NASCAR Grand National West Series’ Drive for Diversity program. She captured four top-10 finishes from 13 starts in 2005 and was awarded the Most
Popular Driver Award for the fourth time in her career. In 2006, Fisher turned her focus to academia, working towards a bachelor’s degree, while competing in a handful of events in the IZOD IndyCar Series and running a full IZOD IndyCar Series schedule in 2007. In 2008, she made her seventh start in the Indy 500, and her first start as a team owner. In 2009, Fisher made history, once again, by qualifying for her eighth Indy 500; the most, ever, for a woman in the 93-year history of the event.

Her impact began at a young age, creating a path in life that was far from typical. From age five, she raced quarter-midgets and go-karts until she was a teenager, winning the 1991, ‘93 & ‘94 World Karting Association (WKA) Grand National Championships. By age 15, Fisher was racing Winged Outlaw Sprint cars and winning the 1995 Dirt Track Racing Round-Up Rookie of the Year award. While still in high school, Fisher was delivered to a national audience when NBC’s The Today Show profiled her achievements and pioneering vision to blur the artificial boundaries between men and women in sports, therefore setting a precedent for unique empowerment. A rare woman in a man’s sport, Fisher even admits a few female tendencies, like gardening and a love for cooking. Though she takes her career quite seriously, her passion for winning in no way precludes a passion for shopping, R&B music and Sushi.

Fisher has been a guest or profiled on a variety of national television programs including, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Tonight Show, VH1’s Top 20 Countdown, HBO’s Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, Jeopardy!, NBC Nightly News, CNN, MSNBC, FOX News, The Price is Right, ABC World News Tonight, Good Morning America and FUSE TV’s No. 1 Countdown, among others. She has also appeared in the pages of Teen People, Cosmo Girl, YM, Rolling Stone, Fast Company, Seventeen, Mademoiselle, Accent, Women’s Day, Sports Illustrated, Time, Newsweek, Car and Driver, ESPN the Magazine and U.S. News & World Report, to name a few.

As the racing veteran continues to chip away at the “glass ceiling” that she faces in a world dominated by men, she’s attracted the attention of female pioneers such as Sec. of State Hillary Clinton, racing pioneer Janet Guthrie, tennis great Billie Jean King and Everybody Loves Raymonds’ Emmy Award-winning actress Patricia Heaton.

Along with managing her team, mentoring her brother-in-law in a national midget series, and devoting a lion’s share of her time to auto racing, she still finds time for philanthropy. She’s a frequent guest at children’s hospitals across the country and an annual participant in the RTV6 Toy Drive. In 2008, Fisher launched her team’s “12 Days of Christmas Food Drive”, benefiting a local Indianapolis food pantry
and in 2009 partnered with Susan G. Komen for the Cure® to raise funds and awareness for breast cancer research and community outreach programs by turning her entire team pink, which included her racecar, for the final race of her 2009 IndyCar Series season at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Oct. 10.

FAST FACTS:

Married: Sept. 15, 2007, to her Crew Chief, Andy
First job: her dad’s fabrication shop, Fisher Fabrication
Best moment in racing: launching SFR and qualifying for the teams’ first Indy 500
Favorite gadget: iPhone
Most embarrassing moment: when she dyed her own hair
Favorite designer: Chanel
Proudest moment: realizing how much her parents mean to her
Favorite sports team: Ohio State Football
Favorite band: The Fray
Favorite television show: Friends
Heroes: Dave Fisher, Janet Guthrie, Toby Keith, Ann Stevens, Al Unser and Oprah Winfrey

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