Danica Patrick, A 'Girl Who Raced With Boys,' Rips Questionable Olympics Boxer
Danica Patrick, an actual girl who raced with actual boys for decades in both NASCAR and IndyCar, is chiming in on what took place at yesterday's Olympics.
By now, you all know it. Lord knows I do. I've written about it 8,000 times in a 24-hour span. Seriously, I'm exhausted. But, for those who are lucky enough to have avoided it all yesterday, here's a quick (sort of) recap. Try to keep up.
Algeria's Imane Khelif, an Olympic boxer who was caught last year "pretending to be" a woman after a series of DNA tests, entered the ring in Paris yesterday to begin her quest for a gold medal, and destroyed Italy's Angela Carini so quickly, and so violently, that if you blinked, the fight was over.
I'm talking two massive blows to the face, a possible broken nose, tears – the whole nine yards.
Obviously, the sports-world here in the west was PISSED because Imane's gender has been questioned in the past, specifically by the International Boxing Association, which stripped her of titles last year because of it.
Whew. Got that?
OK, back to Danica Patrick, who posted the below picture – and caption – to her Instagram story yesterday:
"Wrong. And this is coming from a girl who raced with boys."
Danica Patrick is equipped to talk about Olympics controversy
Another Danica Patrick heater! What a couple of weeks for an OutKick favorite. It's amazing how much NASCAR fans like Danica now. I remember back in the day, we HATED her. Couldn't stand her.
When she was in NASCAR for those 8-10 years, it was torture. But now? Now she's a conservative-leaning, sane political commentator on social media with a fire podcast and even hotter posts.
I mean, what a turnaround.
Anyway, back to Imane Khelif – who in one day has become the most famous boxer in the world.
Any sane person with a brain saw this coming from a mile away. In fact, Riley Gaines called it two days ago when she warned someone could be killed if Khelif were allowed to fight.
Now, we don't know all the details. That's also important to note when we're talking about this, and I assume we're going to be talking about it for a while.
Khelif was accused last year by the International Boxing Association president Umar Kremlev of tricking her colleagues and posing as a woman. She was subsequently disqualified from competing in female boxing by the IBA.
"Based on DNA tests, we identified a number of athletes who tried to trick their colleagues into posing as women," Kremlev said at the time, according to Russia’s Tass News Agency. "According to the results of the tests, it was proved that they have XY chromosomes. Such athletes were excluded from competitions."
The Olympics has said – and continues to say – that Khelif has met all the criteria to fight in the women's class. Kheleif's passport says that she is a woman, which apparently is good enough for the committee because they keep pointing to that and saying that's good enough.
So, we don't know – yet – exactly what the deal is here. But it's a talker, and it got Danica Patrick all riled up yesterday.
Frankly, she's pretty equipped to talk about it, too. She DID race against all boys. She was a trailblazer of sorts in the racing world.
As always, we're #TeamDanica here.