Now we'll start to see what Danica Patrick can do

With the IndyCar season over, Danica Patrick can focus solely on stock-car racing and start to get a better handle on racing in the Nationwide Series.

Saturday's Nationwide race at California marks Danica's return to the series since last month's Dover race, but more importantly, this weekend marks the first of six consecutive Nationwide races she'll do to finish the season.

Until now, she hasn't done back-to-back series races since February-March, when she ran at Daytona, California and Las Vegas. After that, she stayed away from the series until June so she could focus on her Indy car season and the Indy 500. After the 500, she started competing in one Nationwide race a month. The results have not been too impressive ("NASCAR has been a humbling experience,'' she said at Dover)and, no doubt, it's led some to question why she's doing this.

Yet, ,consider this: Say you've got something that keeps you busy (whether it's a job, activity or something else) and then you try to do something new but only do that like three days a month. You're not going to be that good at the new thing because you can't put the time into it no matter how talented you might be. But if you had the chance to work on your new thing for six weeks straight, you should be better. if not, then you might want to try something else.

In a basic nutshell, that's kind of Danica's situation. It's rare to see someone excel when they're only doing something for a few days a month and compete against others who are devoted to doing the same thing all the time.

Well, now Danica has the opportunity to focus on the Nationwide Series. This has always been the part of her schedule I've been most intrigued in. I'll be anxious to see how much she impoves. Because her learning curve remains steep with these cars, it would seem likely she should make a lot of progress (whether that shows up in the results we'll have to see because five of the six remaining Naitonwide races are companion events so that means a lot of Cup guys in the field).

"The point is to get experience this year and to get seat time,'' said Danica, whose best finish is a 24th at Chicago in July. 

That's what the next six weeks will be about. This is a chance to better understand the car, better understand what changes cause the car to do what and improve at giving feedback on the car so the crew can make changes based on more precise feedback instead of just trying to guess what her general comments really mean.

This is a time for her to grow as a Nationwide Series driver. The question is will it be enough because there will not be the excuse of her focusing on her IndyCar team.

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