Danica Patrick and the Jaw-Dropping 2013 Daytona 500 Pole

• Conspiracy theorists questioned Danica Patrick’s pole-winning performance at her first Cup race, given her ballyhooed transition from IndyCar.

• Did she get a special boost from NASCAR in inspection or on the air restrictor?

• FOX Sports’ “ghost car” replay that day superimposed runner-up Jeff Gordon’s qualifying lap, and the replay showed where Patrick took a different line at the exit of Turn 2.

When rookie Danica Patrick qualified for her first Indy 500 in 2005, she caught a tail-happy car at the edge of control in Turn 1 on her first lap while the veterans watching from the pit road caught their collective breath.

Although not as gutsy as her first lap, her average speed increased on each of her final three laps for a four-lap average of 227.566 mph and she barely missed the front row. That was the beginning of Danica Mania, which took off when she led the race in the final stages before finishing fourth.

Eight years later, Patrick won the 2013 Daytona 500 pole with a lap of 196.434 mph in a Stewart Haas Racing Chevy at the start of her first full season in the Cup Series.

Conspiracy theorists questioned Patrick’s pole-winning performance at her first Cup race, given her ballyhooed transition from IndyCar as the first woman to race full time in the Cup Series under a three-year contract at SHR with GoDaddy sponsorship. Did she get a special boost from NASCAR in inspection or on the air restrictor?