The way Ashley Freiberg figures it, the car does not know whether a guy or a girl is driving.
“As long as you drive fast,” she says.
The 17-year-old Homer Glen resident and senior-to-be at Lockport High School is very good at doing exactly that. She will make her debut in the Star Mazda Championship series this weekend during the Harrah’s Autobahn Grand Prix at Autobahn Country Club, and she relishes the opportunity.
“Mazda provides a ladder system where you from go-karting to the Skip Butler National Series to Star Mazda to the Atlantic Championship series,” she explained. “I’ve done karting, moved up to the Skip Barber series, which I am in now, and if you do well, you move up to Star Mazda.
“So this is pretty exciting, to have the opportunity to run in it for the first time here at home. It’s a good idea to get my feet wet. I want to run the series next year, and I’ve been testing with my team (Team GDT).”
“Every weekend, whenever I get in a car, my goal is to learn something new,” she said. “I even learn when I wreck. The drivers out here are all so good.”
The Skip Barber is an open-wheel developmental series where cars top out at about 130 mph. Cars in the Star Mazda series top out around 150. But the increased speed is not a concern.
“That doesn’t bother me,” Freiberg said. “A few laps of practice, and you get used to it.”
She takes pride in being the first female in the Skip Barber National Series. She said she looks up to drivers such as Danica Patrick and Simona De Silvestro, who leads the point standings in the Atlantic Championship series and also will be racing this weekend at Autobahn.
But, when Freiberg is asked whether she wants to be the next Danica Patrick, she replies, “No I want to be better than Danica.”
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